Hyperdimension Neptunia: Overdrive
by DracoSlayer95
Summary: What is supposed to be a peaceful day turns into panic when the Goddess, Neptune, suddenly disappears. The search leads to an alternate dimension full of mystery. New faces, but somehow familiar in some way or another. A mighty new utopian nation, or could it be...? At any rate, only one thing is known for certain... The Deltadimension awaits... (Story Currently Undergoing Rewrite)
1. Prologue!

**Ω ** _ _Hyperdimension Neptunia Overdrive __****Ω****

 ** **Main Menu (Press Start)****

 ** **New Game Start,**** ** _ _ **Now loading...**__**

 ** **Prologue****

Gamindustri, a land graced by the presence of the four Goddesses that served to protect it from evil. The lands of Gamindustri are made up of four nations each governed by a Goddess or as they are alternately called, CPU and their sisters the Goddess slash CPU candidates. To the west lies Lastation, the land of Black Regality, ruled by CPU Black Heart and Black Sister. To the north is Lowee, the land of White Serenity, ruled by CPU White Heart and her twin sister, the two White Sisters. To the south there is Leanbox, the land of Green Pastures ruled by its single guardian in the form of CPU Green Heart. And finally, to the west one will find Planeptune, the land of Purple Progress that is watched over by CPU Purple Heart and Purple Sister.

The Goddesses act as both rulers and guardians to the Makers who worship them, always striving to improve their separate nations so as to get the heads-up on one-another. Yet, even despite their friendly rivalry the Goddesses will always be able to band together to stop any evil that threatens to destroy Gamindustri.

Yet all good things must come to an end at some point or another. Now the Goddesses must face the newest threat that lurks around the corner. Yet this threat... Is much closer to them than they could have ever expected.

 ** **Prologue****

Two figures found themselves standing atop a hill, a large rocky hill with dust flying past the two, swords drawn and at the ready. One was a tall woman with dark purple hair tied into two long pigtail braids, blue eyes with unique pupils, clad in a black plugsuit with bits of purple, gray and neon blue, glowing purple butterfly wings floating behind her, wielding a long black and purple katana in her hands. The other a tall woman with long, flowing white hair, teal eyes with the same pupils as the other woman, wearing a black plug suit with bits of white and gray, six large crystal-like wings floating behind her, wielding a large black and white broadsword in hand.

Both fighters looked to be in poor shape, battered and bruised, close to collapsing. Yet their condition would do nothing to stop them, they had a battle to settle and no amount of cuts and bruises were going to stop either of them.

The katana wielding warrior, Purple Heart raised her blade and pointed it directly at her adversary, Black Heart and took a deep breath before speaking.

"I believe this fight has gone on long enough," A mighty conviction shone in her eyes as she spoke, a conviction that would scare off most opponents, but Black Heart was no ordinary opponent.

"Well, I guess we both finally agree on something," Were Black Heart the type of woman who let herself be intimidated by Purple Heart, then she would have no right to call the woman her rival.

"Then, shall we dance?" With no hesitation, Purple Heart raised her left hand to the sky, a giant blade of glowing blue energy beginning to form where her finger pointed in the sky above her.

"It'll take more than that to bring _**me**_ down," Black Heart was not even remotely discouraged by the floating blue blade and prepared her blade as it started to give off a powerful glow of its own, glowing like a bright rainbow.

The two stood there, facing off against one another, staring each other down, waiting for the other to make the first move. Everything fell silent as the two prepared to battle to the death, even the wind that had once been blowing seemed to come to a complete halt. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as the two stared each other down, but just like any other moment...

This one would come to and end just as any other would.

"32 Bit X-Type Blade!" "Torneraid Sword!" All of a sudden the two fighters came to life as the giant blue sword shot towards Black Heart like a rocket, but the white-haired fighter quickly flew forward with her sword ready to strike. Reacting as quickly as she could, Black Heart slashed into the blue sword and cut it in half in a matter of seconds, but Purple Heart took that as her opportunity to fly towards her for an attack. Purple Heart slashed towards the white-haired woman, but Black Heart reacted just in time to stop her opponent's blade with her own.

The two were left in a deadlock, but it ended shortly after as Purple Heart backed away, attempting to put some distance between the two, however, Black Heart would have none of it.

"No you don't!" She zoomed towards Purple Heart, slashing away at her, but was blocked, but it didn't stop Black Heart from zooming around her, slashing away all the while. She was moving very quickly, from above, from behind, it was making it hard for Purple Heart to keep up, although she __was__ able to block most of strikes, until a few inevitably cut her.

"Kuh!" Purple Heart grunted in pain, but she wouldn't let a few cuts stop her and shot forward, unleashing a combination of slashes at her opponent. One after another, until finally she delivered an upward slash, almost knocking away the white-haired woman's sword, giving her an opening. Purple Heart slashed downwards towards her opponent, though Black Heart was able to back away just enough so that the sword hadn't done much damage.

"Tch!" It was clear that both fighters would undoubtedly fall over at any moment. They would need to settle this matter soon, otherwise they would forever be left without an answer as to who was better. Black Heart took her stance, preparing herself for her final attack that would put an end to it. "This will end it!"

"We'll see about that," Not one to back down, Purple Heart took a stance of her own, not wanting to drag this on for longer than it needed to be. All that either of them had left with only their strongest attacks to throw at one another.

"Then will you accept my mightiest blow?!"

"I'll return it one-hundred fold!"

"Infinite Slash!" "Neptune Break!" The two combatants shot towards each other, slashing swiftly at one another. They had turned into a blur of purple and black streaks dashing through the sky, tearing through any and all clouds that may have been nearby. The loud clanging of their swords could probably be heard from at least a mile away if not more. Slashing, cutting, the two refused to give way to the other, continuously clashing swords again and again, leaving each other no opportunity to catch their breath.

To the untrained eye, the two would most likely look like a blur and loud clashing sounds, but it didn't take an untrained eye to see...

"AAAAHH!" Black Heart's sword had met its mark, leaving Purple Heart to fall to the ground. The battle was finally over. Black Heart had finally won.

Black Heart could hardly believe it... She had won... She had finally won. She floated down to her downed opponent, looking her over with her blade ready in case she sprang back up, but when she knew that wouldn't be a problem anymore, now she had finally proven something once and for all.

" _ _I__ am the strongest CPU..." A smile spread over her lips as she took in her victory, a voice from the heavens echoing the phrase that would celebrate her victory...

 **"This match's winner is... Lady Black Heart!"**

 ** **Prologue****

"Aw man! How come I can't beat you?" There came the ever so huffy response from a short-statured girl as she threw her controller to the side.

This girl had lilac eyes and hair of matching color. Her hair is very messy, reaching down to her shoulders with a few bits sticking out to the sides along with some messy bangs, a few reaching to her shoulders and serve to frame her face, and to top it all off she wears two D-pad shaped hair clips. She wears a rather large white hoodie with icy blue accents and purple cuffs and rims with lilac stripes and two pockets that look more like round spheres with lilac-colored x's on them. The strings are made to look like USB cords and the zipper is rather large and circular with a stylized purple N emblazoned onto it. On her legs she wears thigh high white socks with light blue stripes and purple sneakers that also have a similar purple N adorning them, and to top off the whole look she also wears a white tube-like choker around her neck with a light blue dot shining on it. This girl was Neptune, the Goddess of Planeptune herself and main character of all main characters.

"When did you get so good at this, Noire?"

"It's your own fault for getting so full of yourself, Neptune," There came the ever so nonchalant response from the girl sitting right next to Neptune, Noire, CPU of Lastation.

Just from a glance, one could easily tell how different Noire was from Neptune. She had waist length black hair tied into two pigtails held up by two black and blue ribbons, her bangs are also very neat and frame her face quite neatly to show her noticeable red irises. She wears a fancy black dress with detached sleeves and golden accents and buttons with the parts around her breasts being white. Below this she wears a red undershirt with black spiked rims and a white skirt along with a large blue ribbon tied to her back, matching the smaller one worn around her neck around a black and white collar with a golden piece in the center. On her legs she has wears white thigh-high socks worn with a garter belt and equally long black boots while her sleeves reach down and connect to a ring worn around her middle fingers and also have a sphere-like gem on each.

The two were currently settled into Neptune room, a rather spacious room illuminated from the sunlight coming from outside. Aside from the giant television, the only noticeable thing in the room is a large bunk-bed with a few dolls sitting on both of the mattresses.

"Besides, you never stood a chance against me anyway," Said the ravenette, a victorious smile on her face as she partook in her victory over the shorter CPU.

"Boo," As much as Neptune may have wanted to complain she knew that it was mostly the game's fault. Noire's character just so happened to be designed in such a way that it gave her a major advantage over Neptune's character. "Well I'm gonna have a word with whoever made this game, they totally made your character way too OP."

"Don't blame the developers, besides, you shouldn't blame others for your own shortcomings," The black-haired CPU waved a hand dismissively, not bothering to put up with Neptune's shenanigans. "I just happen to be better at this game than you are, that's all there is to it."

Noire's response earned her a huffy expression from Neptune as the lilac-haired girl turned to face away from her friend. "Boo, meanie Noire."

"Geez, you act like such a child sometimes," Noire said that, but she had always felt that Neptune's childishness was more of a charm point than an actual nuisance. Her sheer optimism always served to make the world a happier and brighter place for everyone around her. Not that Noire would ever tell her that, it would probably end up getting to her head.

"Well I'm not giving up just yet! One more time!" Neptune was about to pick up her controller, but it seemed as though Noire had no intention of playing along with her shenanigans any longer.

"That's what you said the last time, and the time before that, and the time before that one," Noire had tried to say no, but she had always had a soft spot for the purple-haired moron. Now however, after playing so many rounds of the same game her patience was beginning to wear her down and no amount of whining and pleading would get her to agree to another round that would was just going to end the same way the last few rounds did. "Besides, I actually have work to do, unlike a certain lazy CPU."

"Oh come on!" Whined the purplette, putting on her best puppy-dog eyes, hoping to goad Noire into playing some more. Neptune was so close to winning, she could just feel it.

"Neptune please, we have much work to do today," A voice came from behind the two, which was soon followed by another.

"Yeah sis, the party's gonna be starting pretty soon."

"Histy! Nep Jr!" Chimed the purple-haired CPU as she ran over to her little sister and glomping her.

Nepgear, Neptune's little sister, was very similar to Neptune in the way of appearance, having the same colored eyes and hair, albeit longer and neater, reaching down to her waist. She is also slightly taller than her sister with neater bangs, with some reaching down to her chest, she also has a bit of a cowlick sticking out to the side of her hair. Her attire consists of what looked like white sailor uniform crossed with a school uniform with purple buttons and purple cuffs and rims with white stripes. To add to the whole school-girl vibe she gave off, she had a yellow ribbon around her neck held together by a purple band with the same stylized N as on Neptune's hoodie. On her legs were a pair of white thigh-high socks with pink stripes while wearing white boots with purple rims and another N symbol on it and even wears a white purse-like object strapped to her thigh. And to indicate her position as Neptune's little sister she wears a similar white tube-like choker with a small pink dot as well as wearing a single D-pad hair clip as opposed to Neptune's two.

Histoire on the other hand was a very small fairy-like being who sat on a floating book. She has blonde hair tied into pig tails by a pair of purple and gold ribbons along with neat bangs, a few of which curled at the ends and reaching her chest, and blue eyes accompanied by a white headpiece with some blue and black decorating it. She wears a purple dress with detached sleeves with white cuffs and golden trims as well as having golden triangles towards the bottom of her dress. To go with her formal attire, she wears a loose green-teal tie around a white collar that also has an N symbol on it to make her allegiance to Planeptune clear. She also wears white thigh-high socks along with white shoes with teal circles on them. And to add to the whole fairy look she also comes with two pieces of metal semi-circles floating by her shoulders as well as holographic purple and blue butterfly wings.

"Sis, we could really use your help setting things up for the party," Said the young candidate, hoping to recruit her sister and get her assistance in getting things set up for the party.

"Hello Nepgear. Histoire," Greeted the ravenette as she turned her head to face the purple-haired sisters.

"Oh, hello Miss Noire," The young candidate waved towards the ravenette.

"Hello Noire, it is a pleasure to see you here," Histoire greeted back.

"You know, I still don't get why you guys decided to throw a party today of all days."

"Oh, well you see, Neptune had wanted to do something to celebrate the success of our series," The tiny fairy oracle explained.

"Is that right? So apparently Neptune __can__ have some good ideas every now and again," Noire joked, and even though she knew Noire was joking, it didn't really sit well with Neptune to hear that since she was always coming up with super awesome ideas.

"I have a lot of good ideas," Said Neptune defensively.

"Like that time you thought it would be a good idea to transform into your Goddess form so you could ride a roller coaster?" Hearing Noire's response earned her a flinch from the purple-haired CPU in question. "Or that time you tried to ride on top of a Fenrir's back?" Another comment another flinch. "Or how about that time you-"

"Stop stop! I get it okay! You don't have to be such a spoilsport about it," The purplette pouted at her raven-haired buddy, clearly feeling dejected at all of those memories being brought up again.

"Neptune, the party!" Histoire reminded. "We are having some trouble with the Fenrir pups. They only seem to listen to you."

"Fenrir pups?" Asked Noire. Why were they bringing in Fenrir pups for a party? It was probably just another of Neptune's crazy ideas, although as Noire would not find out for a few weeks, it was actually Nepgear's idea to bring them in since they didn't have any homes to go back to and their mother had actually passed away soon after they were born.

"Are they being all pouty again?" Said the purple-haired CPU as a small trace of a smile began to creep onto her face. Those little pups were so clingy to her, but they were so darn cute so Neptune didn't really mind it all too much anyway.

"Yes, Uni's trying to help out with them, but they keep running away from her," Clarified Nepgear, a bit worried for her fellow candidate.

"So Uni is here too?" Noire crossed her arms as she walked up to the Planeptune trio of girls, wondering why Uni hadn't told her she was coming out here.

"Yes, I asked her to come before you showed up," Answered Nepgear. "I was going to ask you as well, but she said you were busy at the time," Noire sweatdropped at that, thankful that nobody knew that she was busy sewing some new cosplay outfits for not only herself, but one's fitted for Neptune as well. She was especially thankful that Uni hadn't walked in on her to see that, otherwise she might not have been able to live it down.

"Get back here!" As if on cue, a familiar voice echoed throughout the halls of the Planeptune basilicom. Soon enough, the owner of that voice came rushing through the door to Neptune's room, chasing after a small blue wolf pup with very long fangs and claws for a creature of its size, not to mention the glowing red, almost demented eyes. Without a moments hesitation the pup quickly leaped into the Neptune's arms and she quickly caught the little bugger. "Geez, they really **don't** listen to anyone other than Neptune huh?"

The girl that had just entered was Uni, Noire's younger sister and the CPU candidate of Lastation. In terms of appearance Uni was more or less identical to Noire aside from being slightly shorter, while still having the same red eyes and black hair reaching down to her upper back with some of it being tied into pigtails by black and blue ribbons while the rest hangs down freely as well as having very neat bangs. She wears a black dress with white and gray trims and a circular area around her breasts as well as detached sleeves that reach down to cover her knuckles, each having a gray circle on them. She also has a small cell phone like device strapped to the left side of her dress while on her legs she had black socks reaching to her calves as accompanied by black shoes with gray circles on them. It was very obvious just from a glance that she was Noire's younger sister and played the part quite well.

"Don't worry Uni," Nepgear said as she placed a hand on her friend's shoulder to console her. "I'm sure it's not that they don't like you or something like that, they probably just think sis is their mother since they've never gotten the chance to see their actual mom," Indeed, seeing a trio of poor abandonded Fenrir pups had tugged at Nepgear's heartstrings and gave her the idea to bring them along since they had lost their mother before they were even born. That and they'd be a hit at the party.

"Welp, I guess I better go get these little guys ready for the party," The purple-haired CPU shifted her attention back to Noire. "You're gonna be there right Noire?"

"Well of course I will, I have nothing else to do today after all," Of course it wouldn't be Noire if she didn't respond in proper tsundere fashion. "B-but it's not like I'm doing it for you, got it?"

"Yeah yeah, I got it," In true Neptune fashion the purple CPU nonchalantly waved a hand in front of Noire before turning towards her door and making her way out with the small wolf pup in her arms. "See ya guys!" The purplette gave one last wave before dashing out the door, leaving her friends to chat amongst themselves.

"Still, did you really have to throw the party today though? Couldn't you have waited a bit longer to really put it on?" Asked an inquisitive Noire, crossing her arms together as she did.

"Yeah, you guys are lucky I didn't have anything to do today, you should be thankful I even came to help at all," Uni said as she stared at Nepgear and Histoire, copying her sister's pose.

"My apologies, but Neptune insisted that we throw a celebration today specifically," What Histoire had failed to mention was that Neptune had chosen today because she knew that none of the CPUs would have much work to do today, including Blanc and Vert. "I suppose she is simply excited about the success of our series thus far and wanted to throw a celebration to commemorate it on the day of our anniversary."

"Yeah, our series is doing great. Four main series games, 3 remakes, 3, but soon to be 4 spin-offs and a few collabs here and there," Counted off Nepgear, recalling all of the success their games had spawned.

"Well I guess when you look at it that way it makes sense," Noire had to admit, their series really was enjoying quite a bit of success, especially considering its humble origins with the first game. Who would have thought that the first game would garner enough interest to spawn a sequel.

"We've come surprisingly far. I almost thought that Planeptune would fall apart before we even got to the second game," Added Histoire, voicing her thoughts.

"Well it is Neptune we're talking about," Added Noire.

"How rude, my sister is a great CPU," Meanwhile Nepgear was getting a bit upset hearing everyone bashing on her beloved older sister. Neptune was a great CPU when she got around to working... She just didn't like to work very often is all.

"Nepgear, your sister is kind of lazy," Uni added. Hearing that only seemed to upset Nepgear even further, but the worst part was that she couldn't entirely argue against what they were all saying.

"Can we please get back to setting up for the party now?" Nepgear suggested, hoping to get the subject away from everyone bashing on her older sister. Luckily everyone seemed to be fine with that idea.

After agreeing on getting back to setting things up for the upcoming party, Histoire took the time to catch Noire up on what they needed help with. Nepgear and Uni decided to get back to getting everything ready while Histoire got Noire all caught up. As for Neptune...

The CPU of Planeptune currently found herself wandering about her basilicom trying to find the other Fenrir pups to get them ready for the party.

"Jeez, where did they even go," She said to no one in particular. While Neptune might have had one of the highest luck stats of anyone in Gamindustri it tended to fail her when she needed it the most. Then again, she had only just started searching. She was practically scripted to get the best results so it shouldn't take too long to-

 _ _"What__ _ _is the reason you fight__ _ _?"__

"Huh...?" The CPU stopped in her tracks, looking around to take in her surroundings. She could have sworn she had just heard someone's voice say something. It was very reminiscent of the first time she'd heard Histoire in the first game.

The CPU wanted to try and figure out where that voice had come from, but when the pup in her arms started licking at her face to see if she was alright her mind forgot about it almost immediately.

"Hey, easy there boy. I gotcha, we need to find your little buddies right?"

The little pup nodded its head in agreement.

"Alrighty then, let's get on it," With no time to spare the CPU went back to her search of the missing Fenrir pups. Although... She was still rather curious just what the heck was up with that voice... Oh well, it couldn't have been anything too important right?

 ** **Prologue****

After what felt like the longest time preparing the many decorations and getting the Fenrir pups all cleaned up, Neptune now found herself standing near the front door to her basilicom, greeting everyone that had decided to show up. It seemed as though almost everyone who was invited had shown up by now, including all of Neptune's maker friends she had met on her wild and crazy adventures. All in all it seemed that the party was going to be way bigger than Neptune had anticipated.

Not to mention that the sight of the basilicom adorned with so many amazing decorations turned it into such a breath-taking sight to behold. All of the shining lights coupled with the regal appearance of the basilicom was quite beautiful for all watching.

"Well this is certainly a bigger turnout than I expected," Neptune turned to face Noire, who had apparently walked over to and started talking to.

"Well of course," The shorter CPU flashed her buddy a cheerful grin. "I have one of the highest luck stats of anyone around," The purplette then proceeded to hold up her hand in a victory symbol.

"Well I guess I can't argue with that logic," Nobody could really argue with __any__ of Neptune's logic, seeing as how it didn't follow any semblance of actual real world logic. The best (and arguably worst) part of Neptune's logic is that it tended to be right whenever she needed to, almost like she really was scripted to get the best results. "By the way, Histoire told me to come get you now that most of the guests have shown up."

"Finally!" Exclaimed the short purplette. Neptune had been wanting to go inside and party up a storm with everyone for so long now. Unfortunately Histoire thought that she should go outside to greet anyone and everyone who showed up. It was totally unfair that Histoire got to have so much fun with everyone else, but Neptune had to wait, but no longer. "What are we waiting for, let's go Noire."

"Hey, what are you-" Noire had little time to react as Neptune grabbed onto her arm and began to lead her back into the basilicom so they could join the party. Although, as much as Noire enjoyed being with Neptune being dragged around by Neptune was an entirely different story. "Let go already!"

"Whoa!" Much to the purplette's dismay, Noire retrieved her arm from Neptune's grasp and began walking in front of her, making sure not to look back at Neptune as she did. "Aw come on, don't be such a party-pooper Noire."

"Just hurry up or I'm gonna leave you behind," The ravenette didn't even bother to turn to look at Neptune, choosing instead to just keep walking forward.

"Oh come one Noi-" Suddenly and without warning a rather familiar feeling overtook Neptune.

 _ _"__ _ _I...can't remember... I just...__ _ _fight__ _ _. That's how its always been."__

"Neptune!" All of a sudden the voices ceased and now Neptune was met with the worried face of Noire, who had tried calling out to the lilac-haired girl. When Neptune didn't respond Noire became rather worried, leading to her waving her hands in front of the girl's face and calling out to her.

"H-huh?" Neptune finally responded, looking very confused and looking at Noire quizzically.

"Finally. You zoned out there for a minute. Are you feeling okay?" Seeing as how Neptune was done dozing off or whatever had happened, Noire let out an inward sigh of relief.

"I'm fine, but uh..." The short CPU rubbed the back of her head before continuing. "Did you hear anything?"

"Hear anything? Like what?"

"Like as voice saying something about not knowing why they fight."

"Huh?" A voice talking about what now? What the heck did Neptune even mean by that? Noire hadn't even heard anything remotely like what Neptune was describing. "No, I didn't hear anything. Are you sure you're alright?"

"Well sure I'm sure," As if to show off just how okay she was, Neptune did a few kangaroo jumps to help get the point across. "If I wasn't all a-okay would I be able to do this?"

"Okay I get it, now stop jumping around like that," While Noire wasn't entirely convinced about Neptune's well-being (she never was), she decided to let the matter drop for the time being, preferring not to waste any more time than they already had. Still, Noire decided to talk to Histoire in case Neptune dozed off again, though hopefully that wouldn't be necessary.

"Then come on slow-poke, there's a party waiting for us to join in," Without wasting anymore time, the purple CPU dashed onward into the basilicom to party it up Planeptune style with all of her buddies from Gamindustri. She was especially looking forward to seeing Blanc and Vert again after so long.

Noire, having been left behind outside, let out an exhausted sigh. It was quite tiresome to deal with Neptune, even during days like these, but even still, she wouldn't have her any other way. "Well, I guess we shouldn't keep everyone waiting," The ravenette walked towards the entrance and followed after her shorter purplette friend.

As she entered she took in the full sight of the whole party going on all around her. All of their friends were here, talking to one another, eating the various treats set out on all the different tables and a few playing with the baby Fenrirs who were dressed up in small suits tailored just for them. Coupled with all the decorations strewn about, including the large sign that read " ** **Happy 5th Anniversary**** ", it was a very lively and cheerful gathering.

Everyone seemed to be having a blast, including Neptune herself as she was chatting up a storm with the older version of herself. The "Adult" Neptune looked like a fusion of both Neptune and Nepgear, being taller than the two girls and bustier as well, wearing the same parka as her shorter counterpart, but instead of white it was black and instead of having lilac x's it had o's. Her hair was also messy like smaller Neptune, but also as long as Nepgear's hair. One difference however was that she wasn't wearing socks, but did have a black version of Neptune's sneakers and also had a black purse-like object strapped to her thigh which was a lot like Nepgear's white one. And to top it all off she also wore a black tube-like choker with a blue dot along with black D-pad hair clips. The only real difference between her and the shorter Neptune was that she was actually a maker rather than being a CPU, meaning that unlike the CPU Neptune, she actually ages like any other maker would. Other than that she was basically the same person, just a bit taller and bustier, and that she could easily pass off as the Planeptune duo's elder sister.

The maker Neptune and the CPU Neptune were currently in the middle of some sort of conversation while sharing a cup of pudding. If Noire had to guess she'd probably just assume that they were talking about how awesome pudding is or something ridiculous like that. Either way, Noire decided to let them be and went off to go and see if she could catch up with everyone, seeing as how she hadn't heard from them in a while.

"Really? Are you okay?" The Maker Neptune asked her otherwordly counterpart.

"I'm fine, but I just can't stop thinking about it now," Replied the CPU Neptune, having just finished explaining what she'd just heard before coming inside, as well as when she was looking for the Fenrir pups.

"Ooh, I bet it was one of those events at the start of a new game," The purple-haired Maker was practically sparkling with excitement at the prospect of a new adventure, and she wasn't the only one either.

"Ooh, I like the way you think, big me," The purple-haired CPU joined in on gushing on the idea of starting a brand new adventure. This was totally like the beginning of the first game where Neptune was guided by Histoire's voice to save the world from a fallen Goddess trying to destroy the world. Just what kind of adventure would she be going on now? Would she travel to another new dimension and learn more about herself through her adventure? Would she have to battle some sort of powerful final boss with the support of all her friends? Or would she maybe possibly end up traveling with some new friends and teach them the value of love and friendship? Or maybe would she find a new rival and end up having to convince her to join the side of good? Ooh, just thinking about it made her feel so excited! "Oh, I'm so excited I almost peed a little."

"Me too!" From then on the two Neptunes discussed what kind of adventure they might end up on and going all goo-goo about some awesome ideas for adventures. The two looked to the world like the world's closest sisters passing around stories and all-around enjoying each other's company. Most all of their friends seeing the two talking just smiled and left them to their own devices as the continued to pass around scenario after scenario while occasionally stopping to eat some pudding every now and again.

The two continued on for like that for what felt like hours when it was really only around 20 minutes or so, completely engrossed in their little chat. The two were so engrossed in fact that they hadn't noticed Nepgear approaching them to say hello.

"And then maybe there'll be some epic battle to bring them back from the brink of despair-"

"And then everyone finds out their tragic past and the fight ends by-"

"Hi sis, what are you two talking about?" Enter Nepgear, curious just what the two versions of her sisters were talking about.

"Oh, hey Jr.!" "Hiya Jr.!" Greeted the bigger and smaller Neptunes, in that order.

"We were talking about our next awesome story. I just know it's gonna be the most awesome on yet," The CPU purplette practically had stars in her eyes as she nerded out in front of her little sister.

"Oh, I see..." The purple-haired candidate wasn't sure what to make of that. On one hand she was happy that her sister was having so much fun with her other self, but on the other she didn't think there would be a new main installment for a while seeing as how the fourth main entry had just come out.

"It's gonna be our biggest adventure yet!" Now the Maker Neptune was starry-eyed as well, practically glowing with anticipation for the events she knew were soon to come. She was also hoping deep down that she would have a chance to really strut her stuff and show everyone what she was made of.

"T-that's great and all, but we just finished up the last game." To which both Neptunes cringed and took a step back, realizing that Nepgear had a point (even though it should have been fairly obvious).

"W-well maybe something'll happen and we'll get another chance for another crazy trek through another dimension." Even despite the glaringly small possibility of a new adventure, the CPU Neptune didn't want to give up hope just yet.

"Y-yeah, I mean who knows, we just gotta keep hope alive Nep Jr.!" Apparently the Maker Neptune was also feeling rather optimistic as well.

"As much as I don't usually mind your optimism, Nepgear's right," Noire, having caught up with some of the Makers she hadn't seen in a while, decided to join in on the conversation going on between the Planeptune trio of purplettes.

"Oh come on Noire, we can still-" Noire didn't let Neptune have the chance to finish that sentence.

"Isn't it selfish of you to want to start another game when the rest of us are still tired after the last one?" Said Noire in an almost exasperated tone. "Everyone just wants to unwind after everything we went through with Uzume, not to mention that Plutia and Peashy could use some time to adjust to the new faces and changes around here," Perhaps Noire was coming off harsher than she had intended, but she didn't feel like getting into another mess of a story just because Neptune couldn't wait for the next one.

"But Noire, I-"

"Don't you "But Noire" me!" Now Noire knew she was being way too harsh, but she just couldn't stop herself for some reason. The words just seemed to flow out of her mouth. "Everyone here can only put up with your ridiculous shenanigans for so long. For once could you do us all a favor and put a lid on it?" Noire immediately came to regret letting those words slip out of her mouth.

"I..." Neptune was stunned. She felt so dejected hearing that, and while a part of her knew Noire probably hadn't meant anything by it a part of her just felt so shaken up to hear her say that. "I need some air."

"Ah..." Noire could only watch as Neptune back towards the basilicom entrance. She would definitely have to go apologize to her for that.

"You didn't have to be so harsh with her Noire," Scolded Nepgear. While the candidate did agree that her sister could be rather pushy at times she didn't like seeing people being so mean to her sister, especially not someone who was supposed to be one of her closets friends. The purple-haired candidate was about to take off when a hand stopped her from doing so, the taller Neptune's hand to be precise.

"It's alright Nep Jr, I'm sure the other me just needs a little bit of time to herself to cool off is all," While Nepgear had wanted to argue and go anyway she ultimately decided that the only person who knew Neptune better than herself was Neptune, even if this was a Neptune from another dimension.

"Okay," The candidate begrudgingly accepted and decided that she could go see Uni for a bit, but not before turning back to Noire. "I know you probably didn't mean anything by it, but please apologize to my sister when she gets back."

All Noire could do was nod her head 'yes' to that. She was going to apologize at some point anyway, but now she just had one more reason to do so. As soon as Nepgear saw that Noire did indeed feel sorry for snapping at her sister she walked off, leaving the ravenette with the older-looking Neptune.

"Wow Noire, what's gotten into you today?" While the bigger Neptune was a little bit worried about her CPU counterpart she figured she'd be okay. In the meantime she figured she could at least figure out what was bugging Noire.

"It's nothing. I guess I just didn't feel like going through another exhausting ordeal so soon after everything that happened with Uzume," The ravenette crossed her arms, already thinking on how she should say sorry to Neptune.

"Oh, is that all?" Hearing that seemed to perk the purple-haired Maker up quite a bit, putting on the signature Neptune grin that they wore oh so well. "Then I'm sure mini me will forgive you," Neptune was never the type to hold a grudge anyway, regardless of what dimension she hailed from. "Well, I'm gonna go see how Uzume and Umio are doing. They said they were gonna be bringing this new type of pudding they found recently and I wanted to make sure to save some for me and myself."

Noire was then left to watch as the taller of the two Neptunes dashed onward in search of the aforementioned Umio and Uzume, practically drooling at the mouth, eager to get a taste of some more pudding. Seeing this earned a rather coy smile from Noire, not that Neptune could even see it, but it was still there. Apparently being exhausting to deal with was a trait that every Neptune shared. Whatever the case may be, Noire took this moment to go off in search of some pudding that she could use as a peace offering for Neptune once she came back.

 ** **Prologue****

"Geez Noire, you don't have to be such a jerk," Neptune mused to herself, talking to no one in particular other than herself. She wasn't really upset or anything, in fact she knew Noire was right.

Right now the purple-haired CPU was sat upon the grass with her back leaning up against a tree just outside of the basilicom.

"What am I doing being all mopey?" Neptune quickly snapped herself out of her little stupor, not wanting to turn into some brooding teenager in some anime or whatever. "I guess Noire did have a bit of a point too... I guess I better go and-"

 _ _"__ _ _I see...__ _ _"__

"Huh? Oh come on! I was just about to get back to the party too. The fun don't start until the Nep walks in," The voices in Neptune's head sure had some pretty inconvenient timing to start up again right as she was getting back to her usual chipper self.

 _ _"__ _ _I do not know why I fight anymore, either. I don't even know why I keep waking up every morning.__ _ _"__

 _ _"__ _ _All my life I've just lived for myself... Now I just feel empty. I don;t want to live for a nation like this. So what the hell am I supposed to do now?__ _ _"__

 _ _"__ _ _I__ _ _wish I knew what to tell you, but...__ _ _I don't even know what we should do. We don't exactly have some hero around to show up and__ _ _give us a new path to follow__ _ _."__

Hero? Just what in the world was all this about? Neptune may have been the very picture and embodiment of protagonism across all of Gamindustri, but that didn't make things any easier for her to understand. And why did these voices sound so...depressed?

"Okay, quit playing around! Who's there?" The purplette looked in just about every direction she could, hoping to find some clue as to what was going on right now.

 _ _"__ _ _It'd be nice if... Someone could come and give__ _ _my life meaning__ _ _..."__

 _ _"__ _ _I agree__ _ _... But for now all we can do is just keep walking... I__ _ _suppose__ _ _if we keep living, then something interesting__ _ _is bound__ _ _to happen at some point or another... At least I hope so..."__

Suddenly Neptune began to feel incredibly dizzy, much more so than the first time she'd heard those voices and a hell of a lot worse than when they started back up again while she was talking with Noire. She felt like she was about to puke, but she held it together as best as she could while stumbling around.

Soon enough it came to Neptune's attention that she was no longer in front of her basilicom, but rather... She didn't even _know_ where she was. All she did know was that she could feel the wind rushing past her and that she could see a starry night sky within her field of view.

Something about this whole scenario seemed oddly familiar to her, almost like she'd gone through this every time a new game started. Sadly, Neptune didn't have much time to think on that as she realized that she was approaching the ground at an alarmingly fast speed. She wanted to transform so she could fly up just in time, but that woozy feeling was so overbearing that she wasn't able to properly activate her transformation into her HDD state. As she tried to focus she began to notice what exactly she was rocketing towards. She was headed straight towards a cliff overlooking a huge forest. On top of said cliff she could see a group of three figures standing on top of it. She couldn't quite make them all out, but she did notice that one was considerably bigger than the other two. Now all the CPU could really do was watch on in horror as she continued to plummet.

A deafening ****BOOM**** resounded as the purple-haired CPU finally made contact with the cliff, kicking up a large amount of dust from the impact, obscuring the figures that were supposedly standing here.

"Owwie! That really stings," The short purplette tried to stand up despite the walloping her body had just received from that cliff, but she wasn't given any time to think on it. "What the?"

"Hey, get out of he-"

Whoever had been talking was cut off as Neptune heard a loud ****SLASH**** cutting them off. All of a sudden the short-statured CPU found herself looking up at the night sky.

"Huh... What happened...just now?" The CPU's world was starting to feel really blurry all of a sudden. Why was she looking up at the sky? "Why... Does my head feel... Wet?" The CPU reached a hand up to her head to check and see what was going on and felt that it was indeed very wet. Despite her vision blurring and her body going numb, Neptune brought her hand back so she could look at it and saw...

Red.

Why was her hand so red all of a sudden?

"Hey! Don't close your eyes!"

"We have to hurry!"

Neptune's vision was slowly turning black, her consciousness fading fast. The last thing she saw before she slipped into darkness was the sight of a silver blur accompanied by a smaller golden one approaching her. If Neptune had been able to stay awake for at least a few more seconds she would have also seen that large body the two blurs were leaving behind, covered in blood and lying on the ground, dead.

 ** **Prologue****

"Sis sure has been gone for a while now," Nepgear was beginning to grow worried. Neptune wasn't usually the type to be gone for very long.

"I'll go and check on her," Proposed the bigger version of Neptune. "You guys know me, maybe she just fell asleep or something," Hearing that seemed to relieve Nepgear's worries, if only by a little bit, but not entirely. Not to mention that the party just didn't feel as lively without her.

"I hope so," The candidate watched on as her sister's doppelganger took off in search of her smaller self. While she stood around, waiting patiently for some good news, Noire was also feeling a similar sense of worry.

"Where is that idiot?" Was all she could bring herself to say, growing more worried and guilty with each passing second that Neptune didn't show up. She wasn't still upset about what Noire said was she? No, that didn't sound right. Neptune probably wasn't even upset to begin with, but probably just a bit taken aback is all. Maybe Noire had been a __little__ bit harsh about voicing her thoughts, but that didn't mean Neptune had been all too hurt by it... Right?

The ravenette could do nothing more than to wait for Neptune's return. She had even fetched some pudding to offer as an apology to help make it easier for her. All she had to do now was just wait.

Seconds turned to minutes and soon enough, minutes began to feel like hours and it only served to make Noire grow ever more worried for every passing second she didn't see Neptune. All of her waiting was soon ended as the other dimension's version of Neptune ran back into the basilicom, panting and huffing a bit. That wasn't a good sign, but it only got worse when she started speaking.

"I can't find her anywhere!"

This wasn't a good sign at all.

 ** **Prologue Chapter: End.****

 ** **Returning to Main Menu...****

 ** **Ω**** ** _ _ **Hyperdimension Neptunia Overdrive**__** ** **Ω****

 ** **Main Menu,**** ** _ _ **Developers Notes**__** ** **(Basically just a glorified Authors Notes)****

 ** **Well there you have it, the start of what is probably my most ambitious project to date. I hope you guys enjoyed this first chapter as well, I spent quite a bit of time on it. As for how this is going to work, I will be adding one of these D/N's at the end of every Act which means you're not gonna get to see another of these for a while. These little notes are just meant to give a little bit of insight as to what was going through my head as I wrote this. There'll be some trivia on characters as well as some insight on the concepts and ideas behind each character. Also, feel free to ask questions if you want to know some more stuff about this story, as long as you don't ask for spoilers then I'd be happy to answer any questions people send my way. Also, just to clarify, this story will be divided into about 5 acts, this was just the prologue so I don't have too much else to say other than...****

 ** **Happy 5th Anniversary to Hyperdimension Neptunia!****

 ** **I really wanted to do something special to commemorate the event so I decided to start this project that I'd been planning for a while now. I hope you guys enjoyed reading it as much as I liked writing it and since I have nothing else to say, I'll see you in the next chapter. See Ya!****

 ** **Important**** ** **Update: This chapter has been modified slightly to fit the changes I have made to the story's themes and main focus since the last time I worked on it.****


	2. Prelude To Adventure!

**Prelude To Adventure**

"I can't find her anywhere!" It only took those five short words to send Nepgear into a panic upon hearing them. Her eyes widened, all thoughts in her mind being completely forgotten and replaced with concern for her older sister's well-being. Before she even knew it, Nepgear was already running past the other Neptune and right out through the basilicom doors. "Hey! Junior, wait!"

"SIS?!" Nepgear had shut out everyone else around her. As a result, the purple candidate didn't notice the raven haired CPU that quickly followed after her when she heard the words that had escaped the taller version of Neptune's mouth. She didn't even bother to stop to look at her sister's other dimensional doppelganger while she was calling out the purple candidate's name. Instead, she ran outside the basilicom, crying out for her sister, desperately hoping that she was just playing a practical joke, but even still, she worried. "Sis?! Where are you?!"

As Noire came close, she approached Neptune's look-alike, hoping for some clarity on the situation. "What do you mean you can't find her?"

"What do you mean what do I mean?" Neptune said, a bit louder than she had originally intended, showing her clear feelings of panic and confusion. This caused Noire to take a step back at the sudden spike in volume. "I can't find mini me! I looked all over the place! I couldn't find her in any of the usual spots we hang out in!" As Neptune finished, she realized that she had surprised Noire, making her feel sorry for the sudden outburst. "S-sorry about that. I'm just really worried about mini me right now."

"N-no, it's alright," Noire said, holding her hand up in the hopes of helping Neptune's bigger self calm down, even if only a little bit. It seemed to work, if the smile she got in response was any indication, but it soon left Neptune's face.

"This is the worst way to start a party!" Neptune shot her arms into the air, more out of worry for her smaller buddy than frustration. It just wasn't right to start a party with the main character disappearing all of a sudden! It practically went against the laws of parties, or something like that. "I hope mini me is okay."

"I'm sure she's fine. This _is_ you were talking about. Even if she's the you from another dimension," This seemed to do wonders in helping big Neptune feel a little better about the current situation. Of course, that didn't mean it would erase her worries altogether, but it was a start. "Come on, let's go help Nepgear look around and see if we can find any sign of her."

"You betcha!" Neptune offered Noire a thumbs up, coupled with another smile adorning her features. "Hey, Junior! Wait up!" The purple haired maker soon found herself running after Nepgear once more. Two heads were better than one when it came to looking for someone after all.

"I can't wait! I need to find sis and-" Before Nepgear could finish that sentence, Noire interrupted her.

"We get it! But there's only so much one person can do." Luckily, this seemed to get Nepgear to quiet down for a second. "If you'll let us help we can find her much faster than if you look all by yourself."

"Yeah, yeah." Neptune added, nodding her head enthusiastically, almost like an excited puppy.

"...Okay." After giving Noire a nod of her head in approval, Nepgear returned to her search of her sister, albeit with a bit more confidence now that she had Noire and her sister's doppelganger to help in the endeavor. It also brought the formings of a smile onto her face, despite the minor sense of panic still holding onto her. It also helped her reaffirm one very crucial and important thing she had temporarily forgotten while her panic had gotten the best of her.

Neptune…was really lucky to have such good friends.

 **Prelude To Adventure**

As the sun slowly rose in the sky, light began to seep into the room. It wasn't anything overly fancy or extravagant. Rather, it was just a simple bedroom with light silver walls, a large television, a moderately sized dresser with a mirror attached to it, a window adorned with some blue curtains, and lastly a bed on which a short girl was resting upon. As more and more light crawled into her room and illuminated her figure, she began to stir and slowly lift herself from her bed, yawning and stretching her arms out as she did. She took her time in getting out of bed, mostly because she wasn't really a morning person at all, not to mention that her body felt rather numb for some reason. Luckily, it wasn't all that bad, although all the bandages she had around parts of her body would suggest otherwise.

However, at the moment, she was too groggy to really care or think about it too much, and instead got into her usual morning routine, which started with getting some clothes on. As she riffled through the dresser she took out something suitable to wear and then proceeded to take off her pajamas so she could get into her new outfit. After she was done, she gave herself a once over in the mirror to make sure it looked alright.

She wore a white sports sweater with lilac accents around the zipper and an icy blue x going from the front to the back with two stripes coming from one shoulder to her hip while the other side had a larger, single stripe from her other shoulder to her other hip. The thicker stripe also gave way to a white circle over the girl's heart that held a rather unique symbol of a dark blue circle of sorts with wings and a crown-like shape on the bottom of it. Her skirt was black with white flowery patterns adorning it while on her legs were black stockings along with a pair of white running sneakers with lilac accents. Both her sweater and skirt seemed to have two loops each that were added to carry around her katana. To top it all off, she also wore a necklace made of up several dark blue stones going all the way around from the front to the back of her neck. It was the same shade of blue as her eyes and the stones were in the same shape as the diamonds one might see on a playing card… And now that she stopped to look at it, she noticed that there were three little cowlicks sticking up to form a miniature crown of sorts in her dark purple hair… Since when had that been there?

Sadly, as much as she may have wanted to stop for a second to actually ponder where those little antennae had come from, she had better things to worry about at the moment. Instead she went to splash some water on her face and put on her black, finger-less gloves and exited her room after grabbing her twin katana. And as soon as she made her way into her living room, she was met with the figure of a white haired woman who seemed to be tip-toeing her way over to a small table next to her couch with an envelope in her hands.

"Morning," At the sudden greeting from the girl, the white haired intruder stumbled about awkwardly, almost falling over in the process. After a few moments of the spectacle, the white haired woman regained her balance and turned to face the purple haired girl that had oh so kindly, almost given her a heart attack.

"M-morning," The white haired woman greeted with a forced smile and an awkward wave of her hand. "I didn't think you'd be awake at this hour."

"So you just let yourself into my apartment to leave some strange envelope? I think that still counts as breaking and entering," Said the playful purplette.

"You know why I'm here," responded the white haired guest, her voice having regained its normal coolness. "Anyway, I was just gonna drop this off and go, but it is rather strange to see you up so early in the morning, you know."

"Weeeeeell," The purplette stopped for a moment to word her reply properly. Ultimately, she didn't take long in finding good way to deliver it. "Something came up, so I've been getting up earlier to go do quests and stuff, you know," She put on an aloof smile, holding her arm out to the side, as if to go with her reply. Although, her response seemed to make her guest go silent as she began to stare at the purplette with a rather serious expression. Not exactly the reaction she had been expecting, that's for sure.

"Alright." To the girl's surprise, her white haired guest seemed to let the matter drop, although she had a sneaking suspicion that she already knew why the girl had gotten up so early in the morning. "Still, if you're going to go out and take on quests, then remember to take care of yourself."

The purplette stared incredulously for a second before settling her expression back into her trademark smile. "You betcha, Goldie!" Was her response. And, upon seeing such a cheerful smile, the white haired woman gave one of her own. Soon after, she approached the shorter girl.

"This should cover this month's rent," The white haired woman held out the envelope in her hand, which the purplette accepted gratefully with a sincere bow and a quick thank you. "Oh, and before I forget, Histoire is finally coming back from her vacation today. She's already waiting outside near the front of the building to see you."

At the mention of Histoire, the shorter girl's eyes lit up slightly. "Coolios!" With a happy exclamation and a fist pump, she took off for the door without hesitation… just not the one that led to the halls of the apartment complex, no that would be too easy. Instead, she ran to the door to her balcony and quickly jumped off from it as her white haired friend watched on with a wry smile forming on her face. She couldn't help but chuckle as the girl's dark purple hair faded from view.

As the purplette descended from her complex, she couldn't help but enjoy the rush of wind on her face as she fell. Still, now was probably a good time to do that trick she was oh so good at, but first, she placed the envelope into her inventory. As she focused her energy, she adjusted her body so she was falling feet first and began jumping from the various swords that she was summoning as she fell. It was certainly a handy trick for falling without fear of having to take fall damage. Of course, she also un-summoned her swords as her feet left them as well. It wouldn't do to waste more energy on her swords than was needed. Not that they used much energy to summon to begin with, but who cares about semantics when you can summon blue energy swords out of thin air? Or rather, thin magic, in this case… Moving on.

"Aaaaaand, perfect 10!" As her feet finally made contact with the ground after a series of sword jumping, she struck a victorious pose, clearly content with her magnificent landing. However, she didn't want to keep Histy waiting, and soon made her way to the front of the apartment complex to meet up with her small fairy friend. It had been a while since the two had actually seen each other after all. Who wouldn't be excited in that scenario? And, if she was lucky, she might even be able to ask Histoire for some help with something rather important. She just hoped Histy wouldn't be too shocked to hear the news she was about to share.

 **Prelude To Adventure  
**

After the joint search effort of Nepgear, Noire, and the other dimensional Neptune had proven fruitless, the trio were forced to stop and rest. They had searched for over what _felt_ like hours. Truthfully though, they weren't really paying much attention to the time anymore, instead focusing all their efforts in finding the lost CPU. Unfortunately, it looked like they weren't getting anywhere.

"Hey, Noire," After letting herself fall onto her back to rest for a minute, big Neptune turned to Noire to talk to her. "How long have we been looking?" To the group, it felt like they'd been searching for hours, but the reality of the matter was rather different.

"I think it's been about half an hour since we started," And even so, that felt like an exaggeration. But in the end, there was one thing that was for certain. "We need help." Two heads are better than one, and by extension, three are better than two. If that was the case, it'd be even better to have as many heads as possible helping, wouldn't it? They might freak out a bit upon learning of Neptune's sudden disappearance, but right now Nepgear was probably having the worst time of it. At some point, she just fell to her knees and her gaze fell upon the ground, her expression unreadable.

"Sis..." The purple candidate would occasionally say that one word, quietly, desperately hoping that Neptune would just show up soon, but she never did. It was getting to be too much for Nepgear to handle. Heck, it was getting rather hard for Noire and big Neptune to watch her in that state of being.

"Cheer up, Jr.," Neptune said, though she knew her words weren't going to have much of any effect of Nepgear at this point, if it even would affect her at all. "I'm sure that if we ask everyone they'd be willing to help us out."

Nepgear didn't respond. Instead, she remained silent with her eyes on the ground. It looked like she was worse off than either Neptune or Noire had guessed she was, but they quickly reconsidered when she began getting back on her feet. "You're right. I'll go find Histoire."

Both Noire and Neptune were at a loss for words in that moment, being left to watch the new determination burning within the candidate's eyes. It was clear that they weren't giving Nepgear the credit she deserved. She was much more mature than she often let on.

"We'll come too," Neptune spoke as she hopped onto her feet and took after Nepgear, Noire joining in almost immediately after. "I just hope Histy doesn't shut down when she hears that mini me's disappeared," Both Noire and Nepgear inwardly agreed with big Neptune on that one. Histoire may have been quick to scold Neptune for lazing around all day, but she only did it because she cared about her and Nepgear more than anything. All the group could really do was spill the beans and hope Histoire wouldn't have a three day meltdown. Time was of the essence here!

The group quickened their pace, entering the basilicom once more. At first, nobody seemed to notice them, still being too preoccupied by their own merriment and festivities to notice the three. Most of them probably didn't even see them leave to begin with, and the ones who did were probably to preoccupied to even ask. As the trio looked around, they noticed Histoire nearby, having most likely just finished having a conversation with someone and gone off to grab herself something to drink. The fairy like oracle however, was soon interrupted as the trio approached her.

"Oh, hello Miss Noire and..." Histoire stopped herself as she realized that Noire, Nepgear, and big Neptune all wore rather serious, if somewhat apprehensive expressions on their faces. "Is something the matter?" Even as the question left Histoire's lips, something in her gut told her that she wasn't going to like the answer. She just hoped that her gut was wrong about this one.

"W-well, you see… S-sis is..." Nepgear tried to talk, but was soon cut off by Noire's hand. The ravenette then stepped in front of her, choosing to deliver the news herself.

"Neptune's gone missing," The answer left Noire's lips quickly, not wanting to waste any more time they could be using to find the purple haired dunce she called a friend. Histoire on the other hand, upon hearing that, went completely silent and tensed up as the words Noire had spoken slowly sunk in.

"Uh… Histy… You still there?" Seeing as how Histoire wasn't responding, Neptune took the chance to wave a hand in front of her face to see if she'd respond. This lasted for about thirty seconds before Noire gently slapped her hand away. "Owie! You didn't have to slap my hand, Noire," Neptune pouted as she backed off to rub her hand.

"Histoire!" To the surprise of the girls around her, Nepgear had been the one to speak up, forcing their attention onto herself. "I know you're probably very shocked to hear that. So was I when I first heard it, but right now we need your help in finding sis. She's been gone for a while now so we can't afford to waste any time. Please, we need your help."

While Histoire had been reeling upon hearing that Neptune was gone, Nepgear had successfully brought her back to her senses before she could lose them. "Y-yes, But of course. We need to find her quickly," Said Histoire, taking a deep breath to calm herself down.

"We really appreciate this, Histoire," Noire bowed slightly in a show of thanks. "We'll do whatever we can in the meantime."

"You needn't worry," Histoire replied to Noire. "I attached a tracking device to her hair clips in case she ever ended up in another dimension again," At the mention of dimension hopping, the three girls around Histoire seemed to looked a bit shocked. They hadn't even considered that possibility!

"Wait! You don't think-" Before big Neptune could finish that thought, Histoire cut it.

"In the worst case scenario, yes. Although if we are lucky, that won't be a problem," Histoire stopped to rub her temples. Neptune really was a very tiresome person to be around, regardless of where she was or who she was with. Still, her friends wouldn't trade her for the world. "I just wish Neptune wasn't such a magnet for chaos."

To which, both Noire and Nepgear sighed and nodded their heads in agreement with the oracle. Big Neptune however, pouted at the implications behind those words. Either way, it was going to be a rather long day for all of them, especially when they would have to inevitably tell everyone the news.

"Sis… Please be okay."

 **Prelude To Adventure**

After Histoire agreed to help in the search for Neptune, she immediately began her search for the signal given off by the tracking device in her hair clips. However, it had taken far longer than anyone could have expected. Although everyone was expecting that it may take around three hours or so, three days passed and Histoire was still busy searching. Within that time frame, the news of Neptune's disappearance had been passed on to everybody. Everyone...didn't take it all too well, but in the end, they all agreed to help search for Neptune. Sadly, nobody was able to find hide nor hair of the short CPU, but after three long days of searching, Histoire had finally found something.

Noire had been out on patrol when it happened, but she eventually got a call from her sister, Uni, while she was visiting Planeptune, that Histoire had found Neptune's location. Upon hearing the news, Noire transformed into her HDD state and took off for the Planeptune basilicom without hesitation to meet up with Histoire and come up with a plan of action to bring Neptune back. And that brings us to the current situation at hand, with Noire zooming through the skies towards the Planeptune basilicom.

Why was all of that skipped and instead summarized in a few short paragraphs? Because all of that would ultimately feel like filler and wouldn't really do anything other than delay the beginning of our new journey. Using a time skip is much more efficient, and besides, it's not like it's the first one that was used thus far anyway. But that's enough about that, there is a story in need of progressing.

Back with Noire, she found herself approaching the Planeptune basilicom with as much speed as she could muster. When it finally came into view, she only seemed to speed up even further, so much so that she almost didn't see the three figures waiting out on the balcony, one of which being Histoire. As she came within landing distance, Noire slowed down enough to where she could make a safe, graceful landing upon the balcony, reverting to her human form as she did so. And, as soon as she landed she was greeted by two of her fellow CPUs, Blanc, the CPU of Lowee, and Vert, the CPU of Leanbox.

"Hello, Noire. It's good of you to join us," The one to greet Noire was none other than Lady Vert. Vert bears the appearance of a young adult woman with a sizable bust and dark blue eyes. Her blonde, wavy hair being long and reaching down to her waist, being braided from the sides of her head going around to the back of her head. She also has quite a few bangs framing her face and dropping to her shoulders as well. Her attire consists of a dress with a dark green top with gold accents and a sort of clear fabric along the tops of her breasts. Around her neck is a white collar with a green trim and blue button attached to a red and gold ribbon. She also has a large peach colored ribbon around the back of her dress and a long white skirt with golden trims and hearts adorning it. On top of that, she wears large white gloves with gold trims and green accents, as well as wearing green and white boots with golden accents.

"You're late," Was the greeting Noire received from Blanc. Blanc is the most petite of all the CPUs and has short, light brown hair, going down to her chin with her fringe being parted to the left as well as having dark blue eyes. She also wears a large, puffy white hat on her head with blue lining and brown patterns decorating it. She also wears a sleeveless white dress going down to her thighs, having brown accents and trims as well as three brown, stitched x's going down her chest to her belly and a brown belt going around her belly. She also wears a very large coat that slouches to her shoulders with brown fur lining the underside of it and some sticking out around her shoulders. It also has rather large cuffs with brown trims with brown lining going along the sleeves. On her right leg, she wears a white bandage alongside a pair of blue and brown sandals. And finally, around her neck, she wears a blue and white ribbon with a blue button on the center of it. "Everyone else has already gone ahead without us. You should be thankful we actually decided to wait for you."

"I guess," Noire replied with a somewhat aloof attitude. Inside however, she was feeling rather impatient and just wanted to get on with the search for Neptune already. "More importantly, Histoire. You said you found Neptune?" Getting right down to the point, Noire approached the fairy oracle for some answers.

"Yes. It seems as though she really has ended up in another dimension… Again," Histoire's face took on a rather tired expression as she said that. She hadn't expected the search to take so long, but there was no use complaining about it now. What mattered was getting Neptune back home safe and sound as soon as possible. "At any rate, I have already informed the other CPUs as well along with the CPU candidates as well as IF and Compa. They have already gone off in their own separate groups to this new dimension," Histoire then pointed her finger up to the sky, bringing Noire's attention to what she assumed was some sort of dimensional rift that had been opened up. "In order to open up a portal, I enlisted the assistance of both the Ultradimension's Histoire as well as Croire to help (very begrudgingly in Croire's case, but oh well)."

"Uh… Was that really necessary?" Noire sweatdropped as she asked. Opening up a whole portal like that would undoubtedly require a lot of energy. Histoire must have been really serious about bringing Neptune back.

"When Neptune landed in Plutia's dimension time over there seemed to flow differently than it does over here. Once a portal was opened that Neptune used to return, the difference stabilized and time began to flow at the same rate in both of our dimensions," Noire's lips formed into a small 'o' at that explanation. She had almost forgotten all about that. "As such, I felt as though the best decision would be to open up a portal similar to that one in case the difference in time turned out to work against us. It may have taken a great deal of energy, but I believe it should be worth it in the end. Although I am afraid that I won't be able to help this time around. Just the mere act of looking for the signal from her hair clips has worn me out," And that was an understatement. Under normal circumstances it probably would have taken around three months, but Histoire gave it everything she had to find her as soon as possible. It worked, but it resulted in Histoire overworking herself far more than she ever had before.

"That makes sense… Well, I guess we shouldn't keep everyone else waiting then," Noire said, turning to her fellow CPUs. "You know, this is actually kind of nostalgic in a way," At Noire's odd statement, Blanc tilted her head in confusion while Vert raised a finger to clarify for the brunette CPU.

"I believe Noire is referring to how in the early stages of development for our first game, Neptune was not the main character, but rather, she was the objective," And then, like magic, a light bulb seemed to turn on over Blanc's head as the brunette CPU snapped her fingers in realization. "At first we were meant to team up to find out what happened to her with Noire as the protagonist, but eventually Neptune was given the mantle of the main character instead," Vert casually looked over at Noire, smirking at the ravenette's flustered reaction to the reminder of her lost status as main character.

"Oh yeah. Funny how even the developers liked Neptune more than you, Noire," Blanc's offhanded remark served as the last straw that broke the metaphorical camel's back. Noire was about to retort, but seeing as how Histoire saw this as a waste of time, she interjected.

"L-ladies, I don't think now is a good time to be teasing one another while Neptune is lost in another dimension," That seemed to do the trick. It caused Noire to feel a bit flustered as she stopped to reply to Histoire.

"I-I know that! I just don't want them to think I'm still upset about that or anything!" Ah yes. This was one of those moments where Neptune would just love to jump at the chance to tease Noire, but when no such teasing came, Noire actually began to feel a bit odd. She had actually kind of gotten used to Neptune's constant teasing… She wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not, but it still served to emphasize how empty things felt without the purple haired dunce. Noire took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. Getting flustered now wasn't going to be helping anybody, least of all Neptune. With that in mind, the raven haired CPU turned her gaze back to the portal open in the sky, a fierce determination burning in her eyes. "Let's not waste any more time. Let's go."

In almost perfect unison, the trio of CPUs transformed into their HDD states and flew off into the portal floating overhead. As their forms vanished into the depths of that portal, Histoire let out an exhausted sigh. Things just seemed to become more and more hectic with each passing day now, didn't they? Well, whatever the case may have been, the rest was now up to the CPUs to take care of.

"Neptune… Please be okay."

 **Prelude To Adventure**

"Urgh..." As her consciousness returned to her, the short girl immediately felt a great deal of pain shooting through her body. She felt like she had a splitting headache right about now and when she lifted her hand to check on her head, she could feel something. As her senses slowly returned to her, she realized that she could feel that same something around most of her body, whatever it may have been. When she opened her eyes, she found it odd that she could only see out of one of her eyes, but when she titled her head to look down at her body, things began to make more sense. She had bandages wrapping around most of her body, along with most of her head and over one eye. She wasn't quite sure why, but she had an inkling that it had something to do with that stupid headache that was refusing to leave her alone, as well as the reason she was laying on a bed with some sheets over most of her body.

Whatever the case was, she was sure of one thing, and that was that her thoughts were in a jumble and that she was having a lot of trouble remembering anything. The weirdest part however, was that her sudden amnesia almost felt normal for her… Almost as if this wasn't the first time she had lost her memories or something like that… Well, she could worry about that later. Right now she was more focused on figuring out where she was right now. From the looks of it, she was in a small room almost entirely devoid of any decorations whatsoever. There was just a table near a window, a door opposite to where she was, and a chair next to the bed she was lying down on. So not only was she in pain, but on top of that, she had amnesia and didn't even know where she was exactly… Great. What a fantastic way to start off waking up.

The girl's thoughts were cut short as she heard something. When she sat up to look around, which made her ache like crazy, she found that the knob on the door across from her was slowly turning. The girl's breath caught in her throat as the door slowly began opening, making slow, loud creaking noises as it crawled ope-

"Darn thing. I could have sworn I had it oiled the last time I came here," Apprehension and fear was soon replaced with confusion as a voice emanated from the other side of the barely open door. "Ugh… Oh well, I'll just have to remember to take care of that later."

Within seconds of that voice floating into the room, the door was fully open, revealing the owner of said voice for the girl to see, looking rather surprised and a bit embarrassed as well. She was a tall mature adult woman with long, waist length silver hair and dark red eyes with pupils that looked more like slits rather than the round shape they were supposed to take, yet they didn't make her appear overly intimidating. She wore a necklace of dark blue diamond shaped stones going from the front, to the back of her neck. She wore a unique outfit that looked as though it was designed to look similar to a jester's outfit, but not quite one, composed of a black top adorned with a large dark blue x on both the front and back as well as a white sort of fabric going around the neck area. The top also seemed to have a unique symbol of a circle with wings and a sort of crown protruding from the bottom of the circle over her heart. Around her waist was a black skirt going down to her knees with silver, spiky trims and dark blue lining. She wore long black stockings along with black and silver boots around her legs and feet. And on top of all her top seemed be wearing a silver belt which carried a set of two nearly identical black katana. And on top of all that, the woman carried herself in much the same way as a person who had mastered the way of the sword. But right now, that sword master was just staring at the girl in bed, feeling surprised to see her up, and a bit embarrassed at having been heard when she was trying to be quiet.

Pushing those feelings to the side, the silver haired woman walked over to chair next to the bandaged girl's bed and took a seat. "So, how are you feeling?" The woman asked, getting straight to the point, giving the shorter girl a look that was a mix of annoyance and a hint of anger thrown in as well. This caused the shorter girl to shrink away a bit in fear. She changed her mind! Her eyes were totally terrifying! "Well?"

"I-I-I'm f-fine!" The girl's voice had come out much shakier than she had intended it to. She was quite terrified of the gaze the silver haired woman was directing right at her. So much so that she found herself shuffling away as much as she could while on the bed, but soon found herself unable to as the pain in her body was surging back to her in that moment, causing her to double over in pain because of it. "Urrrrgh..."

"You liar. You're nor fine at all," Upon seeing the shorter girl in such pain, the silver haired woman pushed the girl back onto the bed. "Don't push yourself," She said while maintaining her serious expression all the while. "Just rest until you're feeling better for now. I'll take you back to your home once you're well enough to move on your own again," She ended with a dismissive wave of her hand. "Speaking of which, where _do_ you live anyway?"

"I..." The girl stopped for a second to think about that one.

"Well?" Asked the silver haired woman, clearly feeling impatient.

"I don't...remember," said the short girl. Clearly not the response the silver haired woman had been hoping for.

"Great...I was afraid that might be the case seeing as how you took a pretty bad blow to the head," Replied the woman, letting out an exasperated sigh as she thought back to that moment. "How the hell did you even end up there anyway? Actually, never mind. You probably don't even remember that either," The woman took a pause to lean back in her chair and cross one leg over the other in her seat, crossing her arms as she took in a deep breath. "Do you remember your name at least?"

"...Neptune… I think." Answered the lilac haired girl, rather meekly, as she stared at the silver haired woman.

"Well that's a start, I guess," replied the silver swordwoman. "You can call me Silver."

"Is that your name?" Asked Neptune, but as she realized that it was probably a stupid question, she was about to take it back, but before she could…

"Not really," She was given an answer she hadn't expected to even be given in the first place. "I did have an actual name at some point, but I've long since forgotten what it was," Silver uncrossed her as she then turned to look Neptune in the eyes. Her red eyes meeting the shorter girl's lilac ones. "But that's not really important. What's important is that we need to figure out wherever it is you're from so you can go home."

"But I don't remember where-"

"I know," Silver cut Neptune off before she could finish. "But I'd rather not have to spend most of my time looking after some kid I just met that fell from the sky," Neptune flinched as Silver continued on. "Seriously, how does that even happen anyway? That almost gave me a heart attack when you showed up out of nowhere like that."

"I fell...from the sky?" Neptune asked innocently, starting to feel a bit woozy, to which Silver sighed yet again and responded.

"Yeah. You just came out of nowhere and smacked into the ground. Hell, I'm surprised you actually survived the fall."

"Is that why-" Before she could ask, Neptune was once again cut off.

"No. If it's about your memories, then you probably lost them when you got slashed in the head," Silver said as she pointed to the bandages around Neptune's head. At least that finally explained the killer headache she had. "You ended up dropping in right as we were fighting a monster. It attacked you as soon as you stood up from all the dust you kicked up," Silver said. "If we weren't there then you'd probably be dead right about now."

"Thank you..." Neptune said, but there was one thing she was rather curious about that she also wanted to ask. She had to fight back her drowsiness for a bit before she could properly ask though. "Thank you, but… You said, "we"?"

"Yeah. Me and…let's just call her a friend of mine, were both there when it happened. She's actually the one who carried you here, not me. I just took care of any monsters that got in the way."

"Oh… Where is she?" Neptune asked, feeling weaker with each passing second. It was taking a lot for her not to just fall back asleep out of weariness right then and there.

"She's resting right now. She took care of your wounds so you can thank her once she wakes up," Silver said that, but she wasn't really sure for how long she'd be asleep. It had taken a lot out of her to do a blood transfusion out of the blue like that. It was the only real way to keep the girls alive after losing so much blood like that… But still, it begged the question…

What would happen to this girl now that she had some of Silver's blood inside her veins?

It's not like it would matter much to Silver what would happen to this girl, but she was rather curious… Actually, that was kind of a lie. Deep down, Silver did care a little bit. She didn't like the idea of this girl dying when she'd gone to the trouble of giving her some of her own blood just to keep her alive. That idea just didn't sit right with her at all, regardless of whether she knew the girl or not.

"I...see..." Neptune could fight it no longer. Her eyelids finally became too heavy for her to bear as she finally gave in to the calling of the land of dreams, finally content with the knowledge of what had happened to leave her in this situation. However, Silver began to panic a bit when she saw Neptune's eyes close, but when the snores began escaping the lilac haired girl's mouth, she relaxed and regained her composure.

Silver had only really gotten to know this girl for a few minutes now and she was already giving Silver a few minor heart attacks. It made Silver wonder if that was what it must have felt like to have children, but quickly pushed that thought to the side as she focused on the sleeping form of Neptune. The kid really was a handful… But Silver also had to admit… She was actually kind of interesting too. Most people would probably have a hard time sleeping in such a situation, but here slept Neptune. Snoring away as if she didn't have a care in the world.

Pulling the covers over the lilac haired girl's petite body, Silver slowly began to leave the room, making a conservative effort to make as little noise as possible as she did so. Luckily, she was able to make it to the door with no problems, but… Something in her compelled her to stop to look at Neptune once more as the girl was sawing logs.

"Neptune, huh..." Something about that name just sounded so familiar. Silver just couldn't quite place her finger on why though. At the very least, she was pretty sure it wasn't anything bad… At least she didn't think so. "Whatever. Night, kid," Choosing to go get some rest of her own since it was pretty late, Silver left the room, but even as she did, she just couldn't stop thinking about that name.

Neptune… Just who was she anyway?

 **Prelude To Adventure: End**

 **Returning to main menu…**

 **Ω _Hyperdimension Neptunia Overdrive_ Ω**

 **Main Menu, _Developer's Notes_**

 **The long awaited second chapter is finally here! Sorry for the long wait, but this is a series I'd like to put in as much effort into as possible to make it as good as possible. And I know I said that I wouldn't be putting in too many of these D/Ns, but this is a special case. But first of all, I believe I may as well put this here now to keep people informed, but I will not be posting any chapters of Act I until the entire thing is all but finished so that I can make it as awesome as possible for you guys and so that I can upload chapters rather quickly. It might end up taking a while, but please bear with me while I work on it. The reason that I'm uploading this chapter now is because it's technically not part of Act I and to set up a few things for future chapters so I decided to upload it as its own thing since it gives me the chance to say what needs to be said. So there ya go. And now, let's move on to the next tidbit, the new cover art for this story.**

 **For those of you curious about it, it's a symbol that appeared in the concept art for the first HDN game. It's also the same symbol that I was trying to describe on that girl's clothes as they are described in the second segment of this chapter. The symbol itself seemed to also appear on the bodies of all the CPUs HDD forms, except Neptune, implying that it was the original feature used to identify a CPU early on. It was most likely changed after Neptune was made the protagonist since, like I said, Purple Heart didn't seem to have that symbol anywhere on her body at all and was replaced with the power symbol irises as we know them now. I felt as though it would make an appropriate cover since I am going to use a lot of elements from the games to forge this story.**

 **And with all of that, I've said all that I wanted to say. I hope you guys enjoyed it and are looking forward to the official start of Act I. It might end up taking a while, but stay strong. Anyway, I will see you guys then and there.  
** **See ya!**


	3. New World!

**Overdrive Act I: New World**

"I see... It seems like a lot has happened since I went on vacation two months ago, hasn't it?" Histoire said as she brought a hand to her chin, as if thinking about something.

"Yeah, I guess so. That's why I wanna get this all over and done with as soon as possible so we can get back on track, O... Err... Histy," Said the energetic purple haired girl. She didn't feel all too great when she had woken up this morning, but talking to Histy and Goldie almost always helped put her in a better mood, and this time was no exception. "I haven't had any luck looking by myself, but if the two of us work together, we can do anything!"

"Is it really that difficult to get used to calling me that? Well, that aside, you seem to be quite energetic today, I see. To be honest, I was half expecting you to be a bit gloomier than this," Was Histoire's reply to the girl's energetic optimism. It was always a pleasant sight to behold. "I suppose I should expect no less from you," Of course, such an honest compliment, coupled with the fairy's honest and proud smile, had the purplette rubbing the back of her head bashfully with a hint of red on her cheeks.

"Well, you know. It's better to look on the bright side than to let yourself feel all down in the dumps about the situation you're in," Said the purplette. It was a simple outlook, but one that she lived her life by all the same, no matter how bad of a situation she was in, she was going to smile until the bitter end. "Now come on! I want to get this quest over with so we can get back to looking for my little buddy already!"

"Very well then. Then let us proceed with... Oh...?" All of a sudden, the tiny girl stopped in place. "Oh my, how unexpected," Suddenly, the small fairy turned her gaze skyward with a rather surprised look on her face. "This is certainly an unexpected development."

"Huh?" Neptune said, obviously confused, as she tilted her head to the side. What the heck was up in the sky that would make Histy seem so interested. Well, as the purple haired sword wielder looked up she became even more confused. "Uh... O... Histy, there's nothing up there, unless you're looking out for flying cars or something. But I still don't see what's so special about-"

"No, no, that is not it at all," Histoire stopped as she turned her gaze back to face Neptune, who in turn was looking very curious about what exactly the fairy-like being was talking about. "It would seem that a group of girls have opened a portal from their world into ours," Needless to say, but Neptune had no idea how to respond to that. "Oh, wait. It seems as though there are more... Hmm... From what I gather there are about 12 of them split into three groups."

"Uh...?" Was all Neptune could say before Histoire continued in an attempt to clarify the situation.

"There is a group of girls that seem to have opened a portal of sorts from their own dimension to our own," And while that raised more questions than answers, it at least was starting to make a bit of sense to Neptune, so it was a good start. "I am not sure as to why, or how, but it is safe to say that they had help from a being similar to myself."

"Yeah... Wait, what?!" Neptune had almost missed that last part, but once she caught it, it quickly got her gears going and number of questions rising even further. "You mean there's someone in their dimension just like you?"

"I cannot be completely sure," Histoire responded calmly. "However, it is a safe assumption. And if there is someone like that in their dimension, then I can only guess that they had her help in creating a portal into this dimension. However..." Histoire brought a hand to her cheek, almost looking a bit embarrassed with a light blush on her face from embarrassment. "I cannot believe it took me 3 whole seconds to analyze all of that information! I am a failure as this nation's oracle!"

Neptune gaped. _That's what was bothering her?_ She thought to herself. She must have been feeling especially eccentric today. Not that it was a bad thing, but it was still a really silly thing to feel upset about. "O...kay?" What else could she say about that? Neptune couldn't think of anything. In which case, it would probably be better to just stay quiet then. Yeah, that's a good idea.

"I suppose the lamentation of my degrading processing skills will have to wait until later," Histoire said, seemingly snapping out of her funk as if she hadn't been in one to begin with. She also made a quick mental note of retraining her processing skills at some point. "In any case, since they don't seem to be from our dimension, I suggest we do not get in their way. We have no reason to get involved with whatever it is they plan to do here anyway, unless they plan to do something nefarious, but we don't know that yet."

"I guess," Neptune responded, stretching her arms over her head and letting them fall softly onto her head. She was kind of interested in seeing what these people were like, but O... Histy, was right. There really wouldn't be any point to trying to meet them if they'd just get in their way... Although... "But what if we just happen to run into them and they just so happen to be in a bit of a pinch?"

"Well, if that were to happen I suppose it would be alright to lend a hand," The oracle replied. She might not see any point in meeting them, and would prefer not to get involved in business that wouldn't concern her, she wasn't heartless. Should the group of dimension hoppers need help and Neptune and herself happened to be nearby, then what kind of citizens would they be if they just ignored them? _Honestly, knowing you, it wouldn't even matter if I said no. You'd still jump in to help out without a moment's hesitation._ A soft smile graced the oracle's lips as she concluded that train of thought then and there. "Now then. Let us not waste any more time talking about this. We have a quest to complete and an ally in need of assistance. I will do everything in my power to help."

"You're the best O... Histy." Neptune exclaimed cheerfully, pumping a fist into the air. "Now let's get moving."

"And move we shall! Onward to victory!"

 **New World**

"Whoa!" Was the first word to escape Noire's mouth. Upon arrival into the new dimension, there were virtually no words that felt more appropriate than that one at the sight that spread out before the group's very eyes. The sight that stretched out before them was insane. For the longest time they had thought that Planeptune was the most futuristic city, hands down, but now...? That notion had not only been challenged, but it had actually been beaten to a pulp as they witnessed the enormous nation stretching out for miles and miles.

For as far as the eyes could see, was an enormous nation with towering buildings dotting a large portion of the landscape. But that wasn't all to see, because there were more things to see in the sky other than just the colossal buildings, such as the flying cars and other various vehicles zooming by at high speeds. And on top of all of that was all of the various holographic images displayed around on the sides of buildings as well as several on a much closer to the ground near roads and walkways. The walkways in particular seemed to make up many of the higher roads, making the place seem even bigger and more complicated to traverse than it probably would be for people who lived here for a while and had gotten used to navigating their way around. Add to that the large quantities of people all over the place and it became quite an overwhelming sight. There were so many people that nobody even seemed to notice the group of three girls standing in awe of the nation they were now in.

"I wonder if this is what Planeptune might look like in a few decades," Vert mused to herself. Although her demeanor might have seemed calm and collected on the surface, she was inwardly awestruck at the colossal land stretching out before her and her two other comrades.

"How the hell are we supposed to find our way around a nation this massive?" Blanc said, voicing the thoughts of the trio standing in the middle of a place they'd never seen before. Forget about finding Neptune, how were they supposed to find their way around a place this gargantuan in size when they've never even been here before!?

 **"Hello?"** All ears perked up, a very unusual voice coming from behind the trio of CPUs. But it only got worse when a looming shadow encompassed them. All heads immediately snapped back to witness a very familiar, yet simultaneously new sight standing before them.

The thing that had talked to them was a large robot in the spitting image of an Ancient Dragon. A large bipedal dragon with long arms and big claws. A creature with large curved horns and a mouth with sharp jaws to clamp down on its prey. And while most Ancient Dragons usually had brown scales and large wings, this metallic version standing over the CPUs had a sort of white metal sheen and what looked like rocket boosters in place of an Ancient Dragon's wings on its back.

Seeing the metal monster immediately caused the trio of CPUs to reach for their weapons. They knew just how vicious Ancient Dragons could be, but now that they were in a new dimension they had no idea what to expect from such a creature, or any monsters from this dimension for that matter. "Hmm..."

"Vert? What are you doing?" Noire's eyes widened as she witnessed Vert putting her weapon away. It seemed like a crazy thing to do, but there was something that she didn't seem to be picking up on that Vert did.

"Do you want to get yourself killed?!" Blanc shouted as the green CPU calmly approached the mechanical monstrosity. Just what the hell was going through her mind right now that she would just casually walk up to a monster unarmed? That was just asking for trouble!

"Excuse me," Vert began. "Hello. My name is Vert, and these are my two friends, Noire and Blanc," The CPU waved her hand towards the large robot dragon while the other two CPUs merely deadpanned at the Goddess of Leanbox. Vert was either the bravest CPU they'd ever known, or the dumbest one. But seeing as how Neptune already held the crown for stupidity (as far as Blanc was concerned), Vert would have to settle for second place.

 **"** **Greetings.** **Are you three new here?"** The mechanic dragon asked in a robotic tone of voice. In response, Vert offered the looming beast a warm smile and nodded her head, as if to say 'yes'. Noire and Blanc on the other hand were left gaping at the fact that Vert seemed to be striking up a casual conversation with the mechanical monstrosity. **"** **Allow me to introduce myself.** **I am M.A.D model no. 783. I had thought that you and your friends looke** **d** **unfamiliar, but it would make sense if you are new to Arcadius. If you would like, I can** **procure** **a map of the city for you and your friends, Ms. Vert."**

"Why that would be lovely, thank you very much," Vert said, clapping her hands together as she did.

 **"Very well. I will return shortly,"** The metal dragon wasted no time in walking off, away from the trio of CPUs, leaving two of them feeling flabbergasted. Of course, Vert smiled to herself in having successfully avoided any unnecessary altercation.

"...What the hell just happened?" Came the ever so expected response from Blanc.

"How did you even know it wasn't hostile, Vert?" Asked Noire, trying to appear calm as she returned her rapier to her inventory. Of course, when Vert merely chuckled in response to Noire's question, the ravenette started to feel a bit annoyed. "What's so funny?"

"Oh nothing." Vert responded coolly, turning back to her two fellow CPUs. "But didn't you find it a bit odd how there was a giant robotic dragon walking around a populated city?" And, as soon as Vert asked that simple question, a wave of minor embarrassment washed over Noire and Blanc. "I personally found it rather strange, especially since nobody seemed to be batting an eye at the sight of it."

"Th-that's..." Noire wasn't really sure how she should finish that sentence. Vert was right about that. And now that she actually took the moment to look around, nobody really seemed to care about the robotic dragon walking around in such a densely populated area.

"Whatever," Blanc said defiantly, as if trying to get over her embarrassment. "Maybe we can use that thing to get some information about this place."

"Well at least we now know the name of this nation," Vert's comment seemed to earn her a pair of raised eyebrows from her two friends. It was obvious that they wanted some clarification. "He did mention the name "Arcadius" when talking to me, remember?" That seemed to do the trick for Noire and Blanc, almost even making light bulbs go off for above their heads. "Although I suppose we still don't know for sure, but it's a good start."

"I guess so... Well that was fast," As Noire ended that, the large robotic Ancient Dragon had returned with a rolled up map held in its claws. _How is he not tearing that thing with those ridiculous claws?_ Noire questioned mentally. For a giant metallic monster, it was surprisingly gentle with small things.

 **"I have acquired the map, as promised,"** The robot dragon spoke, holding out the rolled up map towards Vert.

"Why thank you very much, no. 783," Vert gave a slight bow as a show of thanks and gratefully grabbed the map. With a map now in their possession, the trio of CPUs were immediately put in a much better position than when they had arrived.

"Having a map is fine and all, but I don't think it's going to help us find the others," Noire said, however, since she had been the last to arrive at the Planeptune basilicom when everyone had been splitting up into groups, there was a rather crucial detail she had missed out on. One that Vert was about to shed some light on for her.

"Oh, you don't need to worry about that," Said Vert, already beginning to inspect the map given to the group. "Before you showed up Nepgear gave each of our groups a communication device so we could keep in touch. She used Uzume's visual radio as a sort of blueprint when designing them... Although I suppose it makes more sense to call it Nepgear's visual radio now," Vert finished, rolling up the map once more and putting it in her inventory.

"Oh..." Well, it certainly would have been nice if Noire had known that sooner. Still, there was nothing she could have done about that now, so it was probably better to just move on. She knew it now, so there was no sense regretting that she wasn't able to arrive any faster than she had.

"By the way," Vert began, once again looking up at the mecha dragon. "If you are no. 783, does that mean there are more just like you around town?"

 **"** **Yes. There are various combat and patrol robots created to maintain the peace of this nation,"** Model no. 783 replied. **"Lady Gold Heart herself was the one who started the initiative,"** Needless to say, but the mention of a Lady Gold Heart piqued the curiosity of the three CPUs. **"We were all created with the sole purpose of protecting this nation and its people. Although all of us pale in comparison to Lady Gold Heart's greatest creation, Project Fable."**

"Project Fable?" Vert asked, tilting her head to one side. "Is that another android like yourself?"

 **"Most information regarding Project Fable is classified. All that is known is that its creation was overseen by Lady Gold Heart personally. Soon after the project was completed, Lady Gold Heart stated that it was her proudest creation. Little else is known about it, aside from its incredible intellect."**

"I see," Vert said, absorbing that information. While she really all too interested in this special project, it was created by the CPU of this land. And if the group could meet with this CPU, their chances of finding Neptune would increase dramatically. "Thank you very much for your assistance, no. 783."

 **"** **You are welcome. If you and your friends require any assistance, the other defense units patrolling the city would gladly offer their assistance,"** As the robotic patrolman finished, it turned away from the group of three standing before him. **"Best of luck to you three. I must now return to my patrol duties. Do not hesitate to ask other patrol units for help."**

"Thank you. We will be sure to keep that in mind," The green CPU replied, giving the helpful patrol unit a grateful bow. Before turning back to her fellow CPUs. "Well, it seems like we have our first objective in this new nation."

"And that's to meet this Gold Heart and get her to help us find Neptune," Noire added, finishing that thought in Vert's place.

"That doesn't mean she'd be willing to help us," Blanc quickly pointed out. "We don't even know anything about this Gold Heart. Who's to to say she won't just ignore us?" As much as Noire and Vert hated to admit it, Blanc had a good point about that. All they really knew about the Goddess of this nation was that she apparently had the idea to make a bunch of robots to protect her nation. That didn't really tell them anything about what she was like, except that she and Nepgear would probably get along swimmingly if they ever met one another.

"Perhaps, but we don't exactly have much else to go off of," Vert said in response to Blanc's somewhat cynical comment. "If you have any other ideas then feel free to share," Vert said, holding her hand out at Blanc, as if challenging her to come up with a better idea. After the brunette CPU stayed silent for a few seconds and gave a slight scowl at the green CPU, Vert lowered her hand, feeling triumphant. "Then it's decided. We will direct our focus on meeting with the CPU of this nation."

"Then we should probably let the others know as soon as we can," Noire stated firmly, catching Vert's attention.

"But of course," Vert replied. "I was just about to do that myself," The busty CPU wasted no time in withdrawing the communication device Nepgear had given her from her inventory. There was just one little bump in the road that was preventing her from actually turning it on and getting in touch with the others. "Come to think of it... Nepgear never told me how to operate this device," The problem being that she wasn't entirely sure how to operate it.

"You don't know how to turn it on?" Noire asked exasperatedly. She was about to take the thing from Vert, but when she walked up to take the device from the green CPU, she found herself staring at it, rather dumbfounded at that. "This... looks a lot different than anything we're used to seeing, doesn't it?" Noire said, catching Blanc's attention.

"What are you two talking about... What the hell..." Blanc had walked up to the two, but upon seeing the damn thing, she stopped and gave it the same look as her fellow CPUs. None of them had really stopped to ask about how to use it before Nepgear jumped into the portal, but if they had they might have noticed that it looked quite...different from Uzume's visual radio, despite it being used as a blueprint for the damn thing! "...How the hell are we supposed to use this thing?!"

Of course, as one might expect, the sudden outburst from the brunette CPU earned their group quite a few stares from many of the civilians passing by. However, the group of CPUs were too focused on figuring out how to operate the darned gadget Nepgear had given them to even notice the pink-haired girl approaching them. And even if they had noticed, not a single one of them could have possibly ever prepared themselves enough for what was about to come next.

"Excuse me. Are you three having trouble with something?"

 **New World**

"Are you alright, Nep Jr.?" The bigger Neptune asked the young candidate. It was probably pointless to ask, since the answer was so obvious with Nepgear looking as if she hadn't slept in a while. At present, Neptune and the four candidates' group were currently wandering the streets and found themselves in some sort of shopping district with some sort of phoenix-like statue placed in the center area, surrounded by a small patch of white flowers (supposedly that phoenix-like bird was called a Fenghuang or whatever). After some time looking around, the group all stopped to rest in a spot overlooking the place, since it looked as if Nepgear was bothered by something.

"Huh? Oh, don't worry about me. I'm fine, really," She said that, but her appearance would suggest otherwise. Add to that the fact that she wasn't even paying much – if any all – attention to all of the walking (or flying in some cases) mechs patrolling around the city and it was pretty obvious that Nepgear was quite literally worrying herself sick over her older sister's well-being.

Neptune let out a sigh. Putting on a stern expression, she grabbed Nepgear by the shoulders and looked her straight in the eyes. The purple candidate was quite surprised by the sudden action, but that didn't stop Neptune from saying what she felt she needed to. "Nepgear, I promise you we'll find mini me no matter how long we have to look, but right now? Knowing mini me, I'm pretty sure she'd probably pelt you with snacks if she knew you were worrying yourself this badly over her. I get that you're worried about her, but so are the rest of us. We're not in this alone, so take it easy, okay?"

"..." For a moment, Nepgear wasn't sure what to say to that, but after a moment of silence she did all she could think to do. She nodded her head in understanding. In truth, she knew that worrying about Neptune too much was probably only doing more harm than good, but... Neptune _was_ still her older sister, so could anyone really blame her for being so worried? Apparently Neptune thought so, and who could possibly know Neptune better than Neptune? Likely nobody in this entire world or the next.

"Hey!" Uni interrupted, finally joining the scene. "Not to interrupt you two, but if you two are done talking then could you come help me with something?" The raven-haired candidate asked politely. "Those two are starting to look really bored."

The two in question were the two CPU candidates of Lowee, Rom and Ram. The duo both had brown hair, much like their sister, with Ram having waist length hair and Rom wearing hers at shoulder length and both had steel blue eyes like Blanc's. They both wore matching overcoats, the only difference being that Rom's was blue while Ram's was pink, along with their pink and blue caps that were each adorned with a pink rectangle on the center. Both had six yellow button placed parallel along the fronts of their coats and two white puffball underneath their ribbons, with Rom's being pink and Ram's blue. Both dresses had white cuffs and white frills at the bottoms. On their legs were white tights and each had a pair of boots that matched their overcoats with two yellow buttons each and white puffballs and a ribbon on each. To top it all off, they each had a handbag slung across their shoulders, with Rom's being pink and Rom's being blue.

At present, the two Lowee twins were sitting back-to-back on a bench, looking up at the sky with glazed-over eyes. They looked as if they were about to fall asleep from boredom at any given moment. Hell, Uni was just surprised that they didn't already fall asleep right then and there.

"Hey, Rom?"

"Yeah?"

"How long have we been here?"

"I don't know."

The two Lowee twins sighed in unison, sinking down even further into the bench they sat on. In truth, they weren't really bored per se, but more that they were just bummed out that they were separated from their sister, Blanc. They wanted to go with her, but Blanc told them to go ahead without her and that she'd catch up with them later. And even though they hadn't been separated for very long, it still felt like an eternity for the young and impatient Lowee twins.

Seeing the two acting so...uncharacteristically, Neptune decided to go talk with them, Uni and Nepgear both following shortly after. "Hey kiddos. Why so glum?" Neptune began, goofy smile on her face as always. "We're in a new town, a new nation we've never seen before. You should be turning those frowns upside-down!" To accentuate her point, Neptune made a frown with her fingers and flipped it over, mimicking her words.

"B-but... The buildings are so big. A-a-and there are so many people. A-and we don't even know where Blanc is." Rom stuttered out meekly.

"Yeah! She said she'd meet up with us soon, but how is she gonna do that when everything here is so huge?!" Rom whined. "It would take forever for us to find her!"

"Well... There is one way we can meet up with her." Nepgear meekly added, joining the conversation, if it could even be called one. Both Rom and Ram instantly jolted up to look up at her.

"Why didn't you say something sooner, dummy?!" Ram said, as elegant as always. "We've been walking around for who know how long and you're only now just telling us?"

"No! Bad Ram!" Rom said suddenly, causing her younger twin to almost jump at her older twin's sudden and almost uncharacteristic outburst, especially after she'd been looking so tired earlier. "M-Ms. Nepgear didn't do anything wrong. Sh-she's just really worried about her sister is all. We would be too if Blanc disappeared."

"Urgh... Alright fine, I'm sorry." Ram bowed her head to Nepgear politely. It just goes to show how much influence Rom held over Ram.

"N-no, it's alright. I... It's my fault for not getting my act together sooner," Nepgear tried to assure the two. "It's not your fault, it's mine for letting myself get so hung up about...all of this... I... I'll try not to hold everyone back from now on, though. I promise!" Nepgear had said that in the hopes of getting Ram to calm down. Interestingly enough, she more or less succeed, just not in the way she had been hoping.

"Tch... Ahh!" Instead of cooling off, Nepgear's remark made Ram feel even worse about what she had said. "If you talk like that it's impossible to be mad at you! Just... Just stop looking so gloomy and I'll forget about it!"

"..." At first, Nepgear wasn't really sure how she should react to that, but eventually she settled for a simple smile. It was clear that Ram was also concerned about the purple candidate; she just didn't know how to properly show it. "Thank you, Ram. I promise I'll try."

"Awww. It's good to see you guys are making up already," Neptune chimed in, happy that the little situation had already resolved itself before it got any worse. "So now that we're done with that, I say we finally get back on track and get to looking for mini me. What do you all say?"

Everybody more than happily agreed with that idea, nodding their heads in approval without hesitation. After that little impromptu detour and mock argument, they were all more than eager to get back on track.

"Good. Has anyone found a map? I don't think we'll be able to find our way around without one," The dimensional traveler asked, holding a hand out as if waiting for an answer from someone.

"Actually yes," Uni began, taking out a map she'd picked up just a short while ago. "And from the looks of it, there's a Guild close to where we are. I think that would be a good place to start," The other four leaned over to get a good look at the map. Unfortunately for Rom and Ram, they didn't exactly know how to read a map, being so young an whatnot, but luckily the others could.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's get moving!" Big Neptune exclaimed, eccentrically pointing her hand forward, one finger pointed forward in a dramatic fashion.

"A-actually, the Guild's in the other direction," Neptune's arm dropped instantly at Uni's calm remark. The purplette had gotten so darn excited that she forgot what direction North was for a brief moment. The taller girl rubbed the back of her head in embarrassment, chuckling awkwardly as she turned back to the proper direction.

"Alrighty then. Let's go," Without another word, the purple Maker walked forward calmly, acting as if she hadn't just totally embarrassed herself in front of four kids. Said kids quickly followed after with Nepgear and Rom smiling awkwardly while Uni and Ram deadpanned at the purple-haired ditz that was leading them around. It was kind of hard to keep on such a calm facade when all the four candidates were all staring at her like that, but Neptune did her best to do so all the same.

With their destination decided, the group of five walked on in the direction of the Guild hall, occasionally stopping to appreciate some of the scenery around them. It was rather hard not to when so many places had unique landmarks like the various statues of different monsters, many of which the girls didn't even recognize, dotted around all over the place. There were even a great deal of shops around that sold various merchandise and just about anything else a person could possibly want.

The entire land was so incredibly futuristic, even more so than Planeptune. But even so, it was so incredibly similar as well in many ways. One of the most noticeable similarities everyone noticed was the various flora that was practically everywhere. On their trek to the Guild hall the group even caught sight of various homes and apartment complexes that that incorporated green architecture as they rode on one of the nation's flying trans systems. It was like looking at entire buildings that had been turned into gardens, but once their bus reached its stop, the group's sightseeing was at an end, as they had finally arrived at their intended destination. And it was certainly quite a sight to behold.

"Whoa!" Neptune's jaw practically fell to the floor as she caught sight of this new nation's Guild hall, while the CPU candidates all shared similar reactions at the sight of the towering building. It may not have been as large as the many skyscrapers that towered around the city, but it was still quite large and regal in its own right.

Leading up to the large building was a path made up of blue stones lined by sets of stone gargoyles made in the image of various monsters, although these were much smaller than the ones the groups had been seeing up until now. The path lead all the way up to a large stairway that led to the very entrance of the Guild itself with a dragon-like gargoyle made up of the same blue stone as the path that lead up to the building standing proudly in front of the building, noticeably bigger than all of the rest. All of that coupled with the various types of flowers surrounding the places the various gargoyles stood made for an incredibly scenic view.

The Guild itself was also quite a sight to behold. It looked almost like some sort of medieval castle, creating a unique contrast with the futuristic city all around it. The part that especially stood out the most was that there was a large blue banner hanging proudly over the entrance to the building itself, adorned with a unique golden symbol the group had never seen before. Needless to say, but the majesty of the place was enough to make the group of girls pause to really take in what they were looking at.

"Whoa! This place looks so cool!" An excited Ram exclaimed. She and Rom both had sparkles in their eyes at the sight of the Guild hall standing proudly before them. It really made them wonder what the parks and carnivals must have been like. The must have been really, really cool, of that, they were sure.

"I-It is pretty impressive, I guess," Uni said, trying not to let her own excitement get the better of her. She hated to admit it, but the Guild here was even more impressive than the one from Lastation, or any of the nations she knew for that matter. It really made her wonder what the Goddess' Basilicom must have looked like if the Guild was this grandiose and impressive.

"Holy cannoli, this place is awesome!" Neptune exclaimed, already having gotten over her awestruck state and running towards the large stone dragon that stood in front of the Guild's entrance. Everyone else however, was still too stuck in their awestruck state to really register that Neptune was already running off ahead of them. Of course, once they did, they quickly followed after her.

"W-wait up, Neptune!" Nepgear shouted as she ran after her sister's doppelganger. She was still stunned by the sight of the proud Guild hall, but now she was at least aware enough to remember what it was she was supposed to be doing. To her surprise, Neptune actually stopped once she was standing in front of the dragon statue, which also made Nepgear realize that it was about twice as tall as Neptune herself was, but that was beside the point.

"Jr. come on! Let's take a picture in front of this thing so we can have something to show mini me when we find her!" The excited purplette exclaimed, holding out her phone. Nepgear soon caught up to Neptune, but before she had a chance to say anything, she had already been pulled over to Neptune's side, causing a surprised yelp to escape her lips. A click sound graced the pair's ears, to which Neptune turned her phone around to get a good look at her new commemorative photo. Once she got a good look at it, she seemed quite pleased by it, promptly putting her phone away once more. "We should really get a picture with mini me, too. Once we find her that is."

Nepgear was about to say something, but once that idea actually began to sink in, she realized that that sounded like a neat idea. It'd be nice to go back home with a few mementos from this new and interesting dimension. "Yeah. We should," Nepgear agreed, smiling slightly at the idea. "I wonder if sis has already seen this place before," Nepgear turned her gaze upwards, looking up at the unique symbol one the banner the Guild was so proudly hanging, thinking about how her sister must have been doing.

"Come on, Nepgear! Quit daydreaming already and let's go," Nepgear found herself being ripped from her thoughts as her fellow CPU candidate, Uni, called out to her. The raven-haired candidate looked a bit impatient as well, not wanting to get sidetracked again.

"Yeah! We gotta go find your sister, don't we?" Ram exclaimed in a rare moment where she and Uni were able to agree on something so readily. Neither of them really liked that idea, but they would have to live with that for now. "Then let's get moving already! Come on, Rom, let's go!"

"Okay," Rom was quick to agree with her sister as the two Lowee twins ran over to the Guild's entrance with the others sighing at the two's overabundance of energy.

"We'd better follow after them before they make any trouble for anyone here," Uni said, feeling rather exasperated at having to deal with the two troublemakers. They were manageable to a certain extent on their own, but when they were together was when things became more of a chaotic storm. It was only made worse by the fact that they were ALWAYS together.

"Well then, let's go. Mini me, here we come!" Neptune exclaimed, chasing after the two twins. Nepgear and Uni following suit, each letting out a short sigh. Never a dull moment in their circle of friends, that was for sure.

Once the group was inside, they were met with a sight befitting of the Guild's castle-like appearance. The entrance itself was a large, stony hall, leading into a room with several information desks while the walls were decorated with various shields and weapons and various emblems. There were several large blue crystals around the room that acted as terminals for accepting quests. There were also a few staircases leading upwards to the Guild library, which also served as a computer room, with all the computers designed to look more like crystal balls in order to keep the feeling of a medieval castle intact. There was clearly a great deal of attention paid in giving the Guild the overall feel and appearance of a proud castle while incorporating the advanced technology of their nation by changing the aesthetics of their tech.

"Ooh, fancy!" Neptune couldn't think of a better way to describe the appearance of the Guild. There were probably several other words that would have been more fitting, but Neptune didn't feel like searching through her entire vocabulary to find any, so that would have to do for now. Taking in the look of the place, Neptune walked over to one of the reception desks to ask some stuff about the place, the candidates following shortly after.

"Huh... Who is..." As the group were making their way to one of the information desks, Rom found herself pausing as her eyes fell upon an interesting blonde-haired girl. She looked to be a teenager and her clothes and overall appearance really made her stand out among everyone else currently in the Guild. She kind of looked almost like some sort of circus performer, but that wasn't what caught Rom's eye. The young candidate couldn't quite put her finger on it, but there was something about that lady that seemed really, really familiar to her for some reason. It was almost as if she knew her or something, but she couldn't quite understand why. However, Rom's train of thought was soon cut short as the blonde stranger stopped right as she made it to the bottom of the stairway and was looking directly at her. "Eep!"

"..." The blonde stranger was looking directly at Rom, a rather quizzical expression on her face as she locked eyes with the young candidate. Something about this person just seemed so familiar, and yet...so different at the same time. Rom wasn't quite sure how to explain it, but it almost felt like she should know this lady, but at the same time, she really didn't. It was really strange to say the least. And the way she was looking at Rom, it almost felt as though the candidate had done something wrong.

The young candidate gulped as she continued looking in the direction of the strange blonde lady. She almost felt like something bad was about to happen. The thought of that even made the poor girl start to shake a little bit, but to her surprise...

"Uh... Hey, are you alright, kiddo?" To her surprise, the blonde lady came rushing to Rom's side. "You're shaking..." The blonde girl said, bringing herself down to eye level so she could properly talk to Rom. Rom still felt a bit uneasy about this, but to her surprise... "Did... Did I scare you? Sorry about that," The blonde lady put a hand on Rom's head and gave her a gentle pat, hoping to calm her down. She offered the little girl a very gentle and warm smile and before Rom even knew it, she found herself feeling then exact opposite of how she had only a few short seconds ago. Her feelings of panic were all but gone as the strange lady was gently rubbing her head. "That's better. I'm sure you'd look much cuter with a smile."

Rom actually found herself blushing a little bit at the mention of her being cute. She wasn't even sure what it was that was making her feel this way, but... But at least this lady didn't seem to be a bad person. "Th-Thank you, Ms."

"Don't worry about it," The blonde stranger stuck her tongue, making a rather goofy expression that Rom couldn't help but laugh at it a little. "Anyway, I really need to get going soon. I have to go meet up with my friends soon."

"Y-you too?" Rom asked innocently. She was a bit sullen that this lady was about to leave so soon after Rom had just met her, but the mention of the word "too" seemed to pique the blonde stranger's curiosity and stop her in place.

"Hm? Are you and your friends here looking for someone?" The blonde stranger asked inquisitively. To which Rom replied by nodding her head and uttering a short 'yes' in response. "I see. I wish I could help out somehow, but I still have to find my own friends first... I'm sure you'll be fine though. Anyway, good luck finding your friend."

"Th-thank you, Ms.," Rom said, smiling back at the blonde teen. "Good luck to you, too."

"Thanks, kiddo," The blonde teen smiled as she stood back up properly. She didn't say another word as she promptly turned back around, walking away from the young candidate. She did have things to do after all. However, as the blonde was beginning to make her leave, Rom had just come to the realization that she still hadn't learned the blonde stranger's name yet. Rom was about to say something to stop her, but before she could do so...

"Hey, Rom! What are you doing?! Come on, let's gooooo!" Ram was beginning to call out to her twin sister. Rom promptly turned to look at her sister, but quickly turned back to see if the blonde lady was still there... But she was already gone. The realization led to Rom feeling a bit downtrodden, making her oblivious to the fact that Ram was walking over to her side. "What's up, Rom? We gotta go ask about Nepgear's sister. Come on."

"O...Okay, sorry..." Rom murmured to her sister, softly nodding her head. The Lowee candidate looked over and realized that everybody had stopped to wait for her. As much as she would have wanted to go ask for that lady's name, she really didn't want to keep everyone waiting. She just hoped that maybe she would be able to see that lady again and properly ask for her name. "Sorry. Let's go back to the others," Ram stated, earning her a friendly smile from Ram. With the determination to find Neptune in mind, the two twins took their places at the side of their friends once more.

Seeing the two twins going back to the group, Neptune was quite intent on asking what Rom was just doing, but... After mulling it over for a bit, she ultimately decided she could let the matter drop for now. She could just ask Rom about it later if she really wanted to know. It probably wasn't a big deal anyway...

"Alrighty. Now let's go talk to someone for real this time," With that thought in mind the group of candidates nodded unanimously. Finally getting back on track, the group approached one of the several desks being manned by Guild agents in the building in the hopes of possibly getting some info, but they certainly weren't expecting what happened next.

"Welcome to the central Arcadius Guild. Do you need any...help...?" To the group's surprise the Guild agent actually seemed to look very surprised about something when she saw them all. The group were about to ask what was wrong, but before they could, the receptionist spoke up once again. "Oh. I'm sorry for staring. It's just that Ms. Neptune never told any of us that she had sisters before."

All it took was the short mentioning of Neptune's name to make everyone's eyes widen. Before the agent even knew it, the group of girls were already leaning uncomfortably close to her. The poor woman didn't even know what to do as she was soon bombarded by a slew of questions from the entire group.

"You know mini me?!"

"Have you seen her?!"

"Where is she?!"

"I-Is she okay?"

"She was here?!"

"Has she come by often?!"

"Where is she now?!"

"H-has she been eating properly?"

The poor agent didn't know what to do as the group all closed in on her like a pack of hungry wolves. It was a very, very uncomfortable situation and she was suddenly wishing she had taken a vacation day today. The whole group continued to bombard the woman with question after question in an unrelenting assault that made the woman shrink back om fear.

"You... You've seen my sister?" All of a sudden, all voices went silent as Nepgear's own seemed to pierce through the noise they were making. The rest of the group all stood aside, giving the receptionist some much needed breathing room and the purple candidate a clear chance to speak. "She was here? P-Please... Please tell me anything you know about her... I...I need to know that she's okay."

The agent suddenly found herself going silent looking at the purple-haired girl in front of her. It looked as if the girl was trying to hold back tears from falling down her cheeks. "Uh... She came in just a while ago to accept a quest. She's probably already exploring the dungeon as we speak," The agent explained calmly, or at least as calm as one could be after being assaulted by so many questions like she had just been. "If you'd like I can go look up what dungeon she was headed off to."

"Please do. I'd really appreciate it," To the agent's surprise, the young purple-haired girl's expression changed to that of a calm smile, as if her fears had just been alleviated. She had almost expected the girl to start crying then and there, but apparently she was stronger than the receptionist had given her credit for. She wasn't sure what this was all about, but she did know one thing: And it was that all of these girls standing in front of her really cared about Neptune. It almost made her feel a bit jealous... Almost.

"Right. Just give me a few minutes and I'll get back to you all as soon as I can," To which the group responded by nodding their heads in approval. "I'll call you up when I find it. Feel free to look around in the meantime. I can tell it's your first time here, so feel free to look around,"

"Of course. And again, thank you so much for your help," Nepgear gave the agent a polite bow in show of her appreciation, the rest of her group quickly copying the gesture in show of gratefulness to the helpful agent. Neptune in particular wore quite a proud smile at Nepgear's show of maturity. It was rather incredible to see just how mature she could be. But then again, that was to be expected of a member of the Nep family.

Neptune almost felt like celebrating. Not only was Nepgear showing off her maturity, but now they even had a lead on where to find the girl's older sister. However, it would be kind of unfair to leave everyone else out of the fun, so that celebration would have to wait until everyone was back in the Hyperdimension and the CPU Neptune was back home where she belonged.

"We should get in touch with the others soon," Nepgear stated. "I'll call them and let them know," The young candidate wasted no time bringing out her new favorite device and proceeded to make a call to Noire's group. In a matter of seconds she found the Black CPU answering the call.

" _H-Hello? Nepgear, is that you?_ " Noire asked from the other end of the call. " _Oh thank goodness. We really had no idea how this thing works,_ " The black CPU said, feeling frustrated over the unnecessary trouble they'd gone through because of it.

"Hey, it's Noirey! What's up girl?!" Neptune chimed in, joining the call. "How are things going on your end?"

" _W-well... Something came up... We kind of...ran into someone quite...interesting on our end._ " As Noire continued to speak, she started to sound a bit...flustered? It was quite unusual to hear Noire talk like that.

"Huh...?" Nepgear tilted her head to the side, confused. Neptune seemed to mimic the gesture. "What do you mean by that?"

" _Well... Let's just say we ran into someone we're all very familiar with._ "

"Wait... Does that mean you've met a doppelganger of someone from our dimension?"

" _Yeah... And you're not going to believe who..._ "

"Well now you've gotten me curious. Who is it?" Nepgear asked, her curiosity growing more and more with each second.

" _You'll see soon enough. But... I think it's best you find out for yourself._ "

"Oh...alright," Nepgear said, sorrowful that her curiosity would go unsatisfied until they met this mysterious person that was able to shock Noire like that.

"Hey, Jr. Isn't there something you wanted to tell them?" Neptune asked, leaning over the purple candidate's shoulder.

"Oh yes, that's right!" Nepgear exclaimed, as if a light bulb had gone on in her head. "We may have found a clue to where Neptune is."

" _Wait, you did?!_ " Noire asked, thoroughly surprised. " _Well, don't keep me waiting! What did you find out?!_ " The ravenette asked with a great deal of impatience.

"We decided to drop go to the Guild to gather information, and one of the workers here said she came by just a while ago. We're waiting to hear more at the moment, and we're not sure if she'll still be out in a dungeon, but it's a start."

" _I see... If we're lucky we'll find her without much trouble, but...things are never that simple with Neptune, are they?_ " Noire sighed before resuming where she left off. " _That aside, our group has decided to got meet with the CPU of this nation to see if she can help us._ "

"Hey! Is that Noire?" Ram chimed in, pushing Nepgear's face to the side. "Is Blanc there with you?"

"R-Ram! Please don't push me like that!"

"Ms. Noire, is Blanc there with you?" Rom asked, also bringing her face close to the communication device.

"Hey! Knock it off, you two!" Uni added, joining the conversation. She attempted to try and pry the two Lowee sisters away from Nepgear, but they weren't budging.

"Guys, come on. Jr. needs some room to breathe, you know?" Neptune jumped in, also trying to get the twins off of the purple sister. Rom didn't put up much resistance, but the same could not be said about Ram.

"I wanna talk to Blanc!" Ram practically shrieked, not budging an inch.

" _W-well, Blanc is here, but... She and Vert are still in shock about...that person I mentioned. In all honesty, the only reason I snapped out of it was because of your guys' call. Otherwise, I'd probably still be in shock like those two._ "

"Well now I'm really curious about this mystery person," Neptune chimed in. "You better introduce us when we meet back up, Noirey. I wanna meet this person who turned Blanny and Vert into a pair of stiff boards."

"Boo! I wanted to talk to Blanc!" Ram whined, finally giving Nepgear some breathing room.

" _There's nothing I can do about it. You'll just have to be patient for now. For now just focus on following any leads you can find and we'll meet up with each other later. And Uni?_ "

"Uh... Yes, sis?" The Lastation candidate shyly asked. "What is it?"

" _Take care of yourself, okay? I can't be there right now, so_ _you_ _make sure_ _everyone doesn't do anything stupid before we meet up again_ _,_ _understood_ _?_ "

"R-right!" The Black CPU candidate instinctively brought up her hand in a sort of mock-salute. She wasn't sure why, but now she just felt silly, and a bit embarrassed. "I'll make sure to keep everyone in line while you're away. You can count on me."

" _Good. That's reassuring to hear._ " Noire spoke in a more calm tone. " _I should probably get back to the others now. If I don't say something they'll probably spend the entire day gaping like a pair of fish. Oh great. I think people are starting to stare now. Gotta go._ "

"Take care, sis."

"Good luck, Ms. Noire."

"Talk to ya later, Noirey!"

"Aw man, I wanna see Blanc looking like a fish!"

"...Me too..."

And with that, Noire had ended the call, leaving the group to their own devices. While normally that would be the end of it, this only left the group wondering just who this person Noire spoke of was. It was someone they knew from the sound of it, but just who could it be to shock them all so thoroughly? Well, whoever this person was, they'd all get the chance to meet her later. But for right now getting in touch with IF's group should take priority.

"Oh goodness! I forgot to tell Noire how to use the device properly." Then again... IF and her group could wait a little longer to hear from the others, couldn't they?

 **New World**

"I think this might just be the most confusing communication device I have ever seen in my whole life," A girl with brown hair sweatdropped at the sight of the device she was looking at. "Couldn't Gear have at least told us how to use this thing before she jumped in? I can't even tell what's the 'on' button on this thing."

The girl in question was IF, a Guild Agent that worked in Planeptune, as well as one of Neptune's closest friends. IF was slightly taller than Neptune and had brown hair that fell to the small of her back. She had green eyes matching her green leafy bow which tied part of her hair into a ponytail on the side of her head, and even wore a black choker around her neck. She was wearing a rather over-sized blue coat that went down to her calves with two red lightning bolts on the arms, as well as having brown fur trims and over-sized, silver buttons. Underneath said coat, she was brandishing a simple black tank top with a silver "i" on it, and short black shorts, as well as a black belt with a silver buckle with "iF" printed on it. Lastly, she wore simple black socks to go with a pair of big, blue boots on her feet.

Standing right next to IF was a rather bubbly girl, her childhood and best friend, Compa, a nurse-in-training. Compa had strawberry-blonde hair of similar length to IF's with eyes of matching color to her hair. Around her neck was a simple black choker with a little heart on it, and on her head she wore a headband with what looked like a knitted circle with a small part cut off of it to make it look like a 'C'. She wore a fluffy wool sweater with detached sleeves and a few fluffy buttons along the top ends of the sleeves. Around her waist was a red, plaid skirt and a medicine back slung around her hips with another large 'C' on it, as well as a heart on the belt she used to keep it in place. On her legs was a pair of black thigh-high socks with pink trims and a pair of white boots that also seemed to be made up of some wool that went just below her knees.

Both IF and Compa were sitting on a bench in what they had come to know as "Dragoon Park". The reason of which being that there was a large statue in the very center of a lancer riding on the back of a wyvern. The park itself was quite beautiful and clean, with many flowers and trees lining the brick roads. There was even a small lake with a few boats slowly wading through the water.

"I wonder if Nep-Nep's been here. It looks so beautiful, don't you think so, Iffy?" Compa asked the brunette Guild Agent, making it very clear that she hadn't been paying attention to IF's complaints about the comm device in the slightest.

"Maybe. I guess it depends on how long she's been here," IF said leaning her back into the bench while putting the comm device down. "The last time she wound up in another dimension she spent over thirteen years over there. We have no idea how long she's even been here."

"..."

"If it's the same as last time, then there's a chance that she's been here for over four years now."

"..."

"Jeez, why does time have to be so complicated across dimensions? It'd be great if things were simpler. Don't you think so, too, Compa?"

"..."

"Compa?" Now that IF was finished rambling about time and dimensions, she noticed that Compa was not only not paying attention to her, but that her gaze was turned skyward. The brunette's curiosity got the better of her and she decided to take a look for herself. When she did, she saw... Well, in truth, she had no idea what she was looking at.

"Hey, Iffy, what do you think that flying thingie is?" Compa finally said after her short silence of watching the skyborn object.

"I have no idea," Was IF's response. The only thing she could really make out was that it was some sort of speeding, blue object that was rocketing across the sky. As the shooting object got closer to where IF and Compa were sitting, they were able to make out the object more clearly. It looked like... "A sword?!" A glowing blue sword was traveling through the sky at blistering speed, and if IF didn't know any better, she could have sworn that she saw a person riding on top of it. Not that it really mattered what she saw in the end, since the flying blade passed right over her head and disappeared just as quickly as it had left. Actually, if IF didn't know any better, it almost looked as if it was speeding up as it took off.

"..."

"..."

IF and Compa were both left in shock at what they'd just seen. Neither could find the proper words to express how they felt in that moment.

"There ya guys are! Plutia and I finally found a map!"

"It took reeeeeaaally long to find one, but we finally did it... Hey, what are you two looking at?"

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Someone was riding a flying sword in the sky!"

"...I really need a vacation..."


	4. Surprise Encounter!

**Surprise Encounter**

"Are they alright? They've been standing like that for a long time now."

"Just leave them be. I'm sure they just need some time to get over... this," Noire said in response to the magenta-haired girl's inquiries.

"...If you say so... Say, Noire was it?"

"Yes?" The black CPU quirked an eyebrow as she awaited a response from the borderline pinkette.

"Do you all know me, by any chance?"

Noire began to sweatdrop. The ravenette was hoping she wouldn't ask that. "W-well...in a way, yes," Was all she could say to answer the girl's question. _If I tell her she has the same name as someone from our dimension she'll think I'm crazy._ _She'd never believe something as crazy as that._ That was the conclusion Noire had come to after giving the situation some thought.

"How so?"

"Well... Umm... A-a-actually..." All of a sudden, it felt as if a light bulb went off over Noire's head, an idea forming. Whether or not it would work was a separate matter entirely. "What did you say your name was again? W-we might have actually misheard it. Yeah, that must be it! We must be thinking of someone else! How silly of us!" As if trying to sell the lie that this was just some sort of misunderstanding, Noire forced out a very awkward laugh, one that the magenta-haired girl in front of her clearly wasn't buying in the slightest.

The magenta-haired girl continued to look at Noire inquisitively. It was clear that she knew the revenette was hiding something from how forced she was coming off, but what it was, she did not know. She took a moment to look Noire over, as if searching for any little thing that would give away her true intentions. In response, the twin-tailed ravenette silently forced down a gulp and gave the purplette another look at the girl's appearance.

The girl stood only slightly taller than Nepgear, probably only a centimeter or two taller than the purple candidate and slightly bustier as well. She had long, magenta-colored, waist-length hair with short bangs over her forehead while a few fell to neck-length to frame her face and served to accentuate a pair of striking yellow eyes. Her attire consisted of a long, white mage robe that reached down to slightly below her knees with long sleeves, icy blue and lilac accents, purple cuffs and a flowery design along the rim, and a few floral patterns along the sleeves. On her feet she wore a pair of white thigh-high socks with and a pair of purple boots with icy blue and lilac accents. Lastly, she carried a white satchel bag around her hip with a long strap slung over her shoulder. The most notable part about her whole attire was that on her chest and over her heart was a an icy blue symbol of a circle with wings coming out of the sides and some sort of crown-like shape coming out from the bottom.

She looked very much like a mage...which was actually quite fitting, in a way. But at the same time, it did not go with the image Noire already had in mind of-

"Magic. My name is Magic," Yeah! That!

 _This girl is nothing like the Magic I know! She's young and calm, not sadistic and old!_ Noire thought to herself incredulously. She had never thought that in her entire life there would come a day when she would ever get to meet a version of Magic that looked and acted so differently. Her appearance definitely matched the name; she looked like a mage, after all. But the name just didn't go with the picture Noire associated it with!

"Ring any bells?" The purplette finally asked.

"N-Nope. Can't say that it does," Noire smiled awkwardly in the hopes that this worlds version of Magic would accept it. Unfortunately, the purplette continued to stare at Noire questioningly. "A-a-anyway, we should probably-"

" **EEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHH!?** "

Noire nearly had a heart attack as Blanc and Vert suddenly came back to life with a loud shout. Both of them were quick to deny the possibility of the girl before them being Magic! There was just no way in hell that this girl could be Magic in any way, shape or form!

"How?! You are nothing like the Magic we know! That is impossible!"

"This has gotta be some kind of joke! You can't be that bitch Magic! She's"

"E-Excuse me?!" Magic interrupted, almost looking offended, most likely because of Blanc's use of the word 'bitch'.

As if broken from a sudden hypnosis, both Blanc and Vert stiffened up as they realized that they had blurted that out without even thinking. An action that they immediately regretted as many onlookers turned their heads to stare at the group. This also earned them a jab to their sides from Noire's elbow and even a glare from the ravenette.

"I-I... I'm sorry. I said that without thinking. Please forgive me."

"Y-yeah... S-sorry... We got a bit carried away. Sorry..."

"..." Magic stood in silence for a few seconds, staring at Blanc and Vert quizzically, and a bit offended, though more curious than anything. After what felt like hours of awkward silence to the three CPUs, but was only a few seconds in reality, the purplette finally sighed in exhaustion. "Ignoring that little outburst..." Blanc and Vert both seemed to let out a sigh of relief when they heard Magic say that. "You three looked like you were having some trouble with something. We can talk about how you three know me later; I'm especially interested in that "nothing like the magic we know" line," All three CPUs gulped audibly. Of course this girl wasn't going to let that go. "So...did you need any help with anything? You looked like you were having trouble with something."

"Oh?" Vert tilted her head to the side, thinking about that for a second. After a moment of thought, she remembered that she and her fellow CPUs had been working to figure out how the comm device Nepgear had given them worked. That was around the time Magic had come up to them and introduced herself to the trio. "Ah, yes. We were trying to figure out how to activate this device," Noire, who had taken it from Vert a while back to answer Nepgear's call, held up the comm device for Magic to see. Vert was a bit surprised to see it wasn't in her hands anymore, but she decided to let it go.

"The person who made this for us didn't tell us how to use it, so we were trying to figure out how it works. And that's when you showed up," Noire elaborated. Magic leaned in slightly to get a better look at the device the ravenette was holding out to her.

"Do you mind if I get a better look at it?" Magic asked. Noire shot Blanc and Vert a quick glance before answering. The two CPUs nodded, as if giving the her the go-ahead, to which Noire responded by handing the device over to Magic. The magenta-haired mage wasted no time taking it and giving it a thorough inspection in the hopes that she might find some clue as to how it worked.

The device in question looked like some sort of wristwatch with a flat, square screen that looked to be turned off at the moment (obviously). The odd thing about it was that it had two little buttons on the sides that didn't seem to do anything when Magic tried pressed them. The screen didn't look much like any watch Magic had seen either, but after giving it some further inspection it turned out to be much simpler than Magic had expected.

"I see..." After a few seconds of checking it out, Magic tapped the device around the top and it promptly came to life, displaying a few different icons and surprising the trio of CPUs. "I think this might also work as a touchscreen device," Magic said as she handed it back to Noire. "The buttons on the side seem to return to the main screen and raising the volume. There also seems to be a small button near the top, even though it doesn't look like one, that's used to turn it on proper."

"Are you freaking kidding me?! We wasted how long trying to figure that out?!" Blanc shouted in a fit of annoyance. "Nepgear couldn't have said that sooner?!"

"Nep...gear?" Magic mumbled the name to herself, going unheard by the others. _That name sounds so familiar for some reason... Especially that 'Nep' part... Does this Nepgear person know Neptune, I wonder?_ The magenta-haired mage made sure to take a mental note to ask about this 'Nepgear' person later.

Meanwhile, Noire and Vert both sighed, suddenly feeling very exhausted. Now that Magic pointed it out, they finally took notice that there was indeed a button on the top of the darned thing. It didn't really look like one though, since it barely had any form of indication that it could be pushed, but it definitely was one. "For as studious as Nepgear is, she can be just as airheaded as her older sister at times," Vert had merely said that without thinking, but little did she know what kind of reaction that simple sentence would elicit from Magic.

 _Sister?! Is that why she has 'Nep' in her name? I guess that could be it, but... Neptune's never made mention of having a sister at all for as long as I've known her... Not even once._ For a brief moment, Magic's expression briefly became more downcast, but she hastily hid her surprise before the others noticed it.

"You have our thanks... Magic..." It was still going to take some time to get used to saying that name without wanting to punch someone. "We really don't know what we'd do if we couldn't contact our friends," Noire said graciously to the purplette. It was a short sentence, probably not something most people would pay much attention to, but to Magic it gave away a very big piece of information.

"Your friends? Are you all looking for someone, by any chance?" The yellow-eyed mage asked curiously. It was a bit of a shot in the dark to be asking that, but Magic's gut was telling her to go with it.

"As a matter of fact, we are," Vert answered. "We came to this nation with the help our friends to look for an old friend of ours."

"An old friend?" Magic already had a pretty good idea where this was going, but she needed to be sure. "Is your friend's name Neptune, by any chance?" At the mention of Neptune's name, all three were taken aback, confirming Magic's suspicions.

"Y-you know her?!" Noire was the first to ask.

"Yes, actually," _Unless you guys are talking about someone else named Neptune_.

"Have you seen her recently? Do you happen to know where she is now?" Vert asked with a glimmer of hope. Unfortunately, there was a limit to how lucky the group could be.

"...Sorry, but I'm afraid I don't."

"Tch! I guess things aren't going to be that easy for us," Blanc spat out, now in a more sour mood. Still, as annoyed as she was about being denied a ticket to getting this whole mess sorted out as soon as possible, she was very curious about something. "Anyway, I hope you don't mind my asking, but how do you know Neptune?" Blanc asked the purplette, crossing her arms as she awaited a response.

"Well... It's kind of embarrassing, but... I'm not entirely sure..." Blanc practically faceplanted onto the pavement at that response. Noire and Vert almost shared a similar reaction, but instead they each settled for a deadpan expression.

"What the hell do you mean you're not sure?!" Blanc yelled out in Magic's face, gaining even more attention from the various people walking around them. Of course now, they were too scared to get too close to Blanc. A wise move.

"I remember meeting her in the hospital..." Silence reigned supreme among the trio of girls, eyes widening in surprise. "A few months back I woke up in the hospital without any memories... I don't know how I ended up there, but I do remember that Neptune would come visit me every day, and she even brought me gifts every now and then. I don't know why she did, but I'm sure I must have known Neptune from before I lost my memories. She was always so nice to me. A-anyway, you did make mention of a 'Nepgear' and that she had a sister, so I thought..." _Why am I even telling you all of this?_ Magic wasn't sure why, but the words just seemed to flow out of her mouth naturally in the presence of these three. It was as if her heart trusted them, while her brain was warning her to be cautious.

Magic fell silent after that, looking down at the ground. Suddenly, Blanc was starting to feel kind of ashamed of herself for having snapped at the girl like she did. "Hey... I'm sorry I yelled at you like that. I got really carried away...again."

"It's alright... There's no way you could have known that..." Magic tried to assure Blanc that she was alright, but the look on her face was still rather forlorn.

"And here I thought the drama wouldn't start until we finally reunited with Neptune," Vert casually interjected, bringing everyone's attention back to her, along with a bit of a scowl from Blanc. "I am very sorry for my colleague's outburst. And I hope it's not much trouble, but could you tell us what you know about Neptune? It has been a while since we've seen her and she's a very dear friend of ours, so anything you can tell us would be of great help to us, no matter how insignificant it may seem," The busty blonde gave the purplette a warm smile, one that seemed to put her more at ease than before.

"...Alright," Magic agreed, traces of a smile returning to her lips. "I don't really know much, but I'll do what I can."

"Thank you. You have no idea how much this helps," Vert stated. "Oh, but let's not do this here. I would rather not attract any more unnecessary attention should Blanc decide to have another fit," A vein could be seen appearing on Blanc's forehead. "From what I gather, there is a cafe nearby. Why don't we talk in there?" The busty blonde pointed to a nearby building. Neither Noire nor Blanc had any objections with this idea, and agreed without complaints, having not had anything to eat yet. Magic herself didn't seem to have any objections, either.

"That sounds nice, but... Do any of you have any money on you?"

"We brought some money in case we would need it. We don't have much," Answered Noire. "But I'm sure it should be enough."

"All right. Shall we get going, then?" The three CPUs were more than happy to get on with that. But that still begged the question... Just why was Magic even going with them? She really wasn't sure of that herself, but... Something about talking to the three girls felt so...nostalgic for some reason. She wasn't sure why, but something in her gut told her that she could trust them. _And who knows? Maybe if I stick with them, I'll get a chance to see Neptune again..._

 **Surprise Encounter**

"Thank you so much for all the help," Nepgear gave a thankful bow in show of appreciation to the helpful Guild agent. "I'd like to see my sister as soon as possible, so we'll be going now," The rest of Nepgear's group all mimicked the purple candidate and bowed in a show of thanks.

"Right. I wish you good luck. Oh, and make sure to be careful out there in the dungeon. That place is very...unique," The agent said, as if trying to warn the group about a possible danger, but being very cryptic in the process.

"What do you mean unique?" Big Neptune asked out of curiosity.

"Well... Since it's probably your first time going there, I really don't want to ruin the experience. If you guys really are related to Ms. Neptune, then I doubt you'll have much trouble withe the monsters there, but just remember to watch your step up there, alright?"

Nobody really understood the cryptic hint, especially the "up there" part, but they nodded as if they understood anyway. Uni had considered asking regardless, but seeing as how Nepgear was starting to get a bit antsy, she decided against it. Leave it to the siscon to be get so riled up about seeing her older sister again as soon as possible. There was that, and there was also the fact that the sooner they found Neptune, the sooner they would get to go home.

With destination in mind, the group took their leave of the Guild, determination to find Neptune swelling to a fever pitch. Supposedly the elder purplette took off to a dungeon relatively close to the outskirts of the nation. From what the'd been told, the dungeon was called the Icarus Road and had some pretty tough monsters lying in wait as well. Still, even if those monsters were pretty tough, everyone was confident that with everything they'd gone through in the past, they would still come out on top no matter what kind of enemy got in their way of finding the purple CPU.

"According to the map, there should be a train station close by," Said Uni, having brought out the map to look at it. "If we use that, then we should be able to get to the dungeon in no time at all."

"Do you... Do you think they use bullet trains to get from place to place?" Nepgear shyly asked. Uni looked at her for a second before smirking slightly at the sight of the girl, glad that she was starting to cheer up a bit. She must have been relieved just knowing that Neptune was safe.

"With all of the high tech this city uses, it'd be weird if they didn't," Was Uni's response. She almost started to regret answering when she saw Nepgear almost drooling at the idea of seeing a bullet train in person...almost. But that aside, Uni didn't want to waste any time, so instead she looked at her map before pointing out the nearest train station. It really was very close by, apparently built there to make travel to dungeons a bit easier for eager quest-takers and adventurers.

"Ooh, I've never seen one of those!" Ram chimed in excitedly.

"Me neither," Rom chimed in, also excited, but more reserved than her twin sister.

Meanwhile big Neptune had a different _train_ of thought going on in her head. _I just hope Nepgear doesn't drool all over the passenger seats when we get there._ Because that was likely going to be the biggest issue they would be facing at the moment. "Well let's get moving, then! Can't keep mini me waiting for too long," Neptune exclaimed. Nobody had any arguments there, so they promptly made their way to the train station.

As the group walked, Nepgear stopped for a moment to look back at the symbol proudly embedded onto the banner on top of the Guild's entrance. It was certainly an interesting symbol, so the purple candidate made sure to snap a picture of it with her N-Gear before returning to her friends' sides. Call it a gut feeling, but something in her gut told her that she should definitely remember what it looked like just in case.

After that, the group headed west of the Guild and after a short walk, and a surprisingly long stairway leading down, they were finally at the station. Although they did have to admit that it was a bit jarring to go from a medieval-looking castle of a Guild to the much more high-tech train station. At the very least, it looked almost exactly how the group had envisioned it would it would... For the most part anyway.

It was very well organized, the floors had a nice sheen to them, and there were also a few potted plants placed close to some benches to liven up the place. There were also holographic images displayed here and there, some advertising products, others displaying the obligatory safety warnings and so on and so forth. What they did not expect however, was the absolutely gargantuan plant placed down in the very center of the station, bathed in a blue-ish light. It was nearly tall enough to touch the ceiling, which made it almost 50 feet tall, finally explaining the long stairway leading inside. The CPU of the land must have some sort of fascination with putting plants or something, because this was kind of ridiculous.

The only thing that seemed a bit odd about the place (aside from the giant plant) was that there weren't very many people around. However, since the place was made with the intention of giving adventurers a quick method of getting from the nation to the dungeons, it kind of made sense. And thanks to the small numbers of people gathering around, it was incredibly easy to go through the usual process of buying a ticket and boarding the train, after they got over the shock of the humongous plant in the middle of the station and convinced the attendants to let Rom and Ram through, of course.

But giant plants and bringing children to dangerous dungeons aside, the inside of the train itself was also very nice and clean. The seats were also quite comfortable as well. The Lowee twins looked a bit nervous to be on-board, but after a few reassuring words from Nepgear and big Neptune, they perked up a bit, and were looking more excited by the minute.

Minutes passed rather slowly as the group patiently waited for the train to depart. Luckily, it wasn't very long before it finally began to move, slowly at first, but eventually picking up speed as it went on. And boy was it fast to pick up speed. While Nepgear had heard that bullet trains were fast, this one particular was moving so fast that everything they could see outside the window had turned into an unintelligible blur. She knew bullet trains were fast, but she definitely hadn't been expecting them to be _this_ fast.

"Whoa! At this speed we'll be there in no time!" Neptune chirped cheerfully. "Kind of makes ya wonder why it's so cheap, doesn't it?" She wondered out loud.

"I heard from Blanc that the rarer something is, the more valuable it is," Much to everyone's surprise, it was Rom who had spoken up, apparently feeling a bit more outgoing today than usual. "And one of the attendants at the station told me that there are a lot of these made to get around town. I think she also said that this one makes most of its money from donations... I think."

"I see..." Uni said, resting an arm on the side of her seat. "I guess the technology around this nation is so advanced that trains like this one have become a more commonplace thing," But more importantly, it also told them quite a bit about the land itself. "And if people really need these to get around effectively, then it really says something about the size of this nation."

"Goodness!" Nepgear exclaimed. "I wonder how the CPU is even able to manage this nation if it's really that big. It's one thing to look after a nation as big as Planeptune, but this one must be even bigger than that."

"I bet she's like some sort of super Histy!" This time, Ram chimed in with her own wild explanation that she totally didn't come up with on the spot. She sounded really silly at first eliciting a few chuckles from everyone, but the more everyone thought about it, the more it sounded like a viable possibility. Histoire was the smartest person they knew, and was capable of doing some amazing things when push came to shove, so it wasn't out of the realm of possibility to say that the CPU of this nation really _was_ like some sort of "super" histy.

"Huh... Now I really wanna know what kind of person she is!" Neptune proclaimed. "Maybe we can go say hi after we reunite with the others. It'd be nice if Crostie could wake up by then."

"Oh, that's right. I almost forgot about Croire," Nepgear spoke. "I wanted to thank her for helping us. What happened to her?"

"Oh, well, she kind of went into sleep mode after she and the Histys made that big ol' portal to this dimension," Explained Neptune. "I guess that must've taken a lot out of her. She hasn't woken up since then." It also didn't help that the Nep-Note was constantly sucking up a little bit of her powers on top of that.

"I see. I hope she gets better soon," Nepgear said. "I'm sure she'll be fine as long as she gets enough rest. And I really hope the Histoires will be alright, too."

"Aw don't worry about it. Umio's over there looking after them, so they'll be fine," Neptune tried to say in assurance, but apparently it wasn't enough to ease Nepgear's worries.

"That's not it. I know Umio will look after them while we're gone, but... Histoire tends to push herself really far whenever Neptune and I are involved. When we were stuck in the Zero Dimension, she gave it everything she had to make a portal for us to get home. And now she's gone as far as creating an even bigger portal with the help of the smaller Histoire and even Croire... I just...don't want her to push herself any more than she already has is all."

"That's true... She's always going to a lot of trouble to keep you and your sister safe," Uni agreed. Rom and Ram on the other hand, had no idea what to say at the moment. Although they did agree with the sentiment, they had no idea what to say about it, or if they even _should_ say anything at all.

"Hmm..." Neptune crossed her arms for a moment, looking out the window as she did. It was still a blurry mess from what she was seeing, and it kind of made her feel a bit sick looking at it, but oh well. "Well, I don't know Histoire as well as you guys do, but I do know one thing." It was then that Neptune turned back to face the others. "If we find little me as soon as possible, then Histy won't need to push herself any more than she already has. Which means that we just need to give it everything we've got to make sure we do."

"..." Leave it to Neptune to think of such a simple solution. It was so like her, Nepgear supposed. "Yeah, I guess you're right. We'll make sure to bring her back without fail. Not just for our sake, but for Histy's, too."

"Of course I'm right. Nobody knows the Nep better than another Nep."

 _That's one way to put it..._ Nepgear thought to herself, scratching her cheek. She was quickly brought out of her thoughts as a bell sounded throughout the train and a voice, presumably the train conductor's, started speaking soon after the bell faded.

" **Attention passengers. We will be arriving at out destination in approximately 15 minutes from now.** **Please be ready to depart in that time. I repeat, we will be arriving at our destination in approximately 15 minutes. Make sure to take all of your belongings with you on your way out. We cannot guarantee their safety if you do not.** "

...

...

...

"Hey... Wasn't that dungeon we were going to in the outskirts of the nation?"

"Yeah... I think so..."

"And didn't we say that this nation was probably twice as big as Planeptune?"

"Might actually be bigger than that."

"How fast would this train have to be going for us to travel that far in 7 minutes?"

"...Faster than we can fly in HDD...?"

...

...

...

It took a while for that to sink in, but once it did, a collective " **EEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHH?!** " could be heard echoing throughout every single train car... Or at least it would have, if each one hadn't been made with sound-proof metal, that is (it was almost they planned for that). But more importantly than the apparent super sonic speed of the train they were riding on, that meant that the group would be at their destination far sooner then the group had initially thought... Which meant that they'd be seeing Neptune a lot sooner than any of them had expected as well.

 **Surprise Encounter**

"Well... It looks like we're here," As the group stepped off the train and made their way out of the little station just barely on the edge of the nation, Nepgear and company stopped to marvel at the land stretching out before their very eyes. The land was massive, and they could see a great deal of monsters roaming around the plains both near and far, many of which they had never seen before. Some hunting others, some running for their lives, and even a few crushing others under foot. The land was also dotted by several rock formations that seemed to lead all the way to a rather small mountain. And according to the Guild Agent they'd talked to, they would have to pass through there to arrive at the dungeon Neptune was supposed to be exploring right now... If she even was there right now.

"This place is massive!" Ram exclaimed, giving voice to everyone's thoughts. That was probably the only thought in everyone's mind, actually. Aside from maybe the fact that all those monsters looked pretty vicious...and hungry... Well... At least now they knew why there were so many patrol mechs walking around the streets. They were probably a necessity to keep normal people safe from these damn things.

"The Guild Agent said that in order to get to the dungeon proper, we need to get to that mountain and find the warp point inside of it," Uni said, looking up at said mountain. It wasn't really a very large one, in fact, it was almost small enough to be classified as a hill, but at least that made things easier for their group! "Now all we have to worry about is all of these monsters here."

"Looks like it. Watch your backs, everyone!" Neptune exclaimed. Everyone quietly nodded in agreement, bringing out their weapons and preparing for battle. "Let's go!"

Unanimously, everyone else yelled the single word "Right!" and sprang into action. The group ran out into the field together, with Neptune and Nepgear at the very forefront, leading the team. The field was very straightforward, with a few inclines and declines here and there, but overall a very simple area to get through.

As the team traversed the field, a few monsters noticed them and attacked.

"Nuraaaaaahh!" The oh so familiar enemy known as the common Dogoo approached. Five of them to be precise.

"Oh, so there are dogoos here, too," Neptune pointed out, glad to at least see a familiar enemy in a place that no doubt had dozens of new ones. "And there's one for each of us!"

The group did not stop charging as the group of dogoos tried to impeded their progress, rather, they actually began to speed up, with their weapons all drawn. The sight of which was really making the tiny slime creatures realize that they had just made a terrible, terrible mistake. Sadly, they were given no time to lament this fact, as the group of girls tore them to shreds in a barrage of slashes, gunfire, and magical spells. The poor, foolish dogoos didn't even stand a chance.

The little slimes had barely even been a distraction, as the group continued to advance forward, making short work of any other enemies that crossed them, consisting of mostly familiar enemies like horsebirds and more little slimes. For the most part, a majority of the enemies they'd encountered were rather familiar to ones they knew as they ran across the fields. They had made it more than halfway across, and things had been going rather smoothly, until a furious growl rumbled through the air.

 **GRRRRRRRRR!**

"What the goodness!" The ever insightful Nepgear was quick to say. The sudden growl took her, and everyone in her party by surprise. "That doesn't sound good."

"Don't worry, Nep Jr.," Neptune waved a hand dismissively, as if to assuage Nepgear's concerns. "Most of the enemies here aren't even that strong, so it'd be weird if we just suddenly ran into some crazy strong boss in the first dungeo-"

 **CRASH!**

Suddenly, a large creature leaped from seemingly out of nowhere, landing right in front of the group, creating a bit of a crater in the ground it landed on. A massive, four-legged beast the size of a Fenrir with a long snout and enormous horns protruding from its head like a bull. The beast was large and covered in brown fur, with long claws coming out of each paw, and teeth almost as large making up its maw. The monster also had a line of black fur going along its back all the way down to its tail, which was the smallest part of its body. The monster was very much like a giant, angry bull with the same demented, red eyes as that of a Fenrir. Almost like some sort of brother species...or maybe a second cousin twice removed.

"..."

"What was that about us being able to handle whatever came at us?" Uni asked sarcastically, her eye and trigger finger twitching.

"W-well... You know... Most tutorial dungeons don't come with super bosses, so..." Was Neptune's defense. Everyone stared at her incredulously, to which she gulped and tried to play it off by taking her battle stance and staring down the hulking monster in front of them. "A-anyway, this big guy's blocking our path, and we gotta beat him if we want to get there." It was very obvious that she was just trying to take some of the heat off of herself, but she was right about one thing.

"It's eyes are scary," Rom almost felt like shrinking back in fear at the sight of them. However, Ram gave her a pat on the back to make sure her sister was alright.

"I-It's fine. W-we've deal with way worse, s-so it's no big deal," Ram was trying her darndest to keep her body from shaking, but it didn't help that the monster was staring right at her. However, that seemed to bother Ram more than anything else. "W-what are you looking at, you big dummy?!"

 **RRRRGGGGHHHHHH!**

The beast let out a low rumble as it swiped its large paw at Neptune, who was easily able to dodge it by hopping backwards. Nepgear took the chance to charge and slashed at the beast from the side. While Rom and Ram had been a bit taken aback by the beast's sudden attack, they quickly recovered and put some distance between them to pelt the beast with ice magic. Uni made sure to put some distance between the beast and herself as well and shot straight at it with her rifle. Her shots didn't seem to do much at first, but they were at least doing something.

Nepgear attempted to slash the beast from the side, but was forced to retreat as it swiped the back of its paw at her violently. This gave Neptune a good opportunity to attack the beast, so she jumped and slashed at its neck with both her blades, causing it to grunt in pain before violently swinging its head at her and batting her away. "Oof!" Neptune landed some distance away from the beast, but performed a quick roll as she hit the ground to get back on her feet. Once she was, she switched out her swords for her pistols to shoot the beast from a distance.

Having gotten fed up with the constant hail of bullets, the behemoth made a change of tactics and rushed forward, directly at Rom and Ram with its horns pointed forward, as if going in to impale them. For a split second the two freaked out, what with the giant bull monster charging at them, but after collecting themselves, they almost immediately calmed down, sharing a quick glance with one another, as if telepathically communicating some sort of plan with their telepathic twinstinct abilities, if that's even a thing.

"Rom! Ram!" Neptune, Nepgear and Uni all sprinted towards the two Lowee twins, watching as the beast charged at them. The two didn't move from there, and as the beast got closer and closer the group was almost completely consumed by the fear that the two were about to become a pink and blue shish-kabob.

"Ready..."

"Go!"

Right before the twins were impaled by the pair of giant horns, the two jumped up into the air, maneuvering themselves just enough to not only avoid getting skewered by the beast's horns, but were able to grab on to them in the process. The beast came to a sliding halt and tried to shake the two off, but they were quite adamant about not letting go. And while the beast was bucking viciously, they took that as their chance to use their magic to freeze the beast's legs to the ground. "Now!"

A coating of ice began to form around the monster's legs. The beast tried to fight it, but even when it was able to free its leg, more ice would just encase it all over again, to the point where it was hardly able to fight it after a while. With this newfound moment of vulnerability, Nepgear and Neptune both dashed towards the beast, ready to unleash their special attack skills as both Rom and Ram jumped off the monster's horns.

"Mirage Dance!"

"Raging Rush!"

From one side Nepgear slashed her sword across the beast's body in a motion that gave the impression she was dancing. From the other, Neptune slashed away at the beast several times before ending her combo with one last powerful slash in tandem with Nepgear's own final strike. The beast roared in pain, but was unable to do anything as it was cut from both sides, and when the final attack landed...

 **GRRRRAAAAAH** **HHhh** **hhhhh** hhhhhhhh...

The behemoth of a beast fell over, exploding into a burst of data, just like any other monster would after being defeated. The group collectively let out a sigh of relief as the monster vanished. However, once the relief faded away... Well, let's just say Uni wasn't all too happy about the stunt the two candidates had just pulled.

"What the hell was that?! That was way too reckless! You two could have gotten yourselves killed just now!" One could easily see all of the anger and annoyance as plain as day on Uni's face. Honestly, Ram was almost expecting for a vein to pop out of her forehead if Uni was going to keep shouting like that.

"Oh come on, we're fine, aren't we?" Was Ram's retort; Simple is best, after all. "We won, so it's all good!"

"S-sorry..." Rom said apologetically, actually feeling bad about making everyone worry, unlike the bashful Ram.

"What if you two had gotten hurt?! Do you have any idea what Blanc would do if she found out you two got hurt?" Uni was not going to let this go, that much was clear. At least not until the twins, but mostly Ram, understood how stupid of a stunt they'd just pulled and how easily they could have gotten hurt because of it. "She'd probably kill us if anything happened!"

"Uni, it's fine. Nothing bad happened this time, so it's okay," Nepgear chimed in, trying to calm down her raven-haired friend.

"Yeah, this time! But what if next time they-"

"Then we just have to make sure to keep a reeeeeally close eye on them from now on," Neptune stated sternly, and just a little bit jovially.

Uni groaned. Leave it to the purple family to take a more lackadaisical stance on this matter. Still, she wouldn't feel better about it until she could make sure Rom and Ram weren't going to pull another stunt like that again. "Fine, but you two had better promise you won't do something like that again, alright?"

"Fine, I promise," Ram begrudgingly replied.

"O-okay... I promise," Rom meekly replied.

"Good, good!" Neptune exclaimed, then turning back to face the spot where that monster had just been. "But still, that was a pretty easy battle for such a cool enemy design... Oh, I see what's going on!" As if the hamster wheel in her head had begun to spin, Neptune came to an epiphany. "That must have just been a tutorial boss. No wonder it went down so easy. I just knew there wouldn't be any super insane enemies in the first dungeon."

How was one supposed to reply to that? Well, Nepgear sweatdropped with an awkward smile plastered on her face, Uni deadpanned, and Rom and Ram just went along with it without saying a word.

"Can we please get back on track now?" Uni asked, prompting everyone to turn towards the almost-but-not-quite a hill mountain they were headed towards in the first place. With it so close by, the team opted to resume their adventure at a more leisurely pace, partially due to a sense of anxiety of what would await them once they were finally in the dungeon. Of course, there was also the thoughts of getting to see Neptune again. To a degree, they were all a bit scared that they had come here for no reason, so it was natural they'd be nervous.

As they continued walking forward, they noticed an opening a little further up the mountain, likely the path leading to the dungeon Neptune was supposed to be in. It wasn't very high up, so they all easily made it inside and were greeted by a short, linear path leading up to a short set of stair with a small warp crystal stationed at the top of it.

"That must be what the Guild Agent was talking about," Uni muttered to herself.

"Yahoo! Let's go see little me again!" Before anyone could say anything about it, Neptune was already running off to the warp point with everyone else hastily following after her. "It's warping time!"

"Wait for us, sis!" Nepgear called after the taller purplette. Soon the eccentric purple-haired girl's hand made contact with the warp point and she quickly vanished from sight. Uni sighed in exhaustion as she and the others quickly followed suit and made contact with the warp point only moments after, and were whisked off to who knows where... Well, at least they'd find out soon enough, and boy was it quite a sight to behold.

 **Surprise Encounter**

As the group of candidates finally emerged from the light they-

"Who-Ooph... Owwie..." ...As they emerged from the light, they quickly fell some height and landed on their butts inside of what they assumed was some sort of cave. It was a rather uncomfortable landing, but at least everyone was still in one piece, so that was a plus. The only real downside was that Uni was currently being crushed under the weight of her three friends...

"So...heavy... Get off of me already!" The ravenette was quick to shove everyone off of her. It wasn't a very pleasant feeling to have a group of people landing on one's back, after all. And after everyone was finally off, Uni stood up and stretched her body a bit to shake off the feeling of pain that tended to come with a group of people landing on one's back. Although Uni supposed it could have been worse.

"Whooooooooaaa!" The sudden and elongated exclamation brought everyone's attention back to reality. It seemed to have come from Neptune, and it sounded like she was just outside of the cave. "Nepgear! Uni! Rom! Ram! You guys have got to see this!"

The group wasted no time picking themselves up and making their way out to meet with Neptune, but as soon as they did they quickly realized that they were not ready for the sight that was there to greet them.

"Wha... Wha... What the goodness?!" The view the group was met with was that of a series of floating islands, coupled nicely with a bird's eye view of the nation they had just been in literally less than an hour ago. It was such an odd experience to be seeing it from so high. That city that had seemed so unbelievably huge and expansive before now looked like a mere anthill from this height. A rather large anthill, but still an anthill nonetheless. "When did we get so high up?!"

"Whoa! This is so cool!" As opposed to Nepgear, Ram actually looked quite ecstatic to be so high up. Rom on the other hand, looked as if she was only moments away from either passing out from the view, or wetting herself out of fear... Possibly both.

"Huh..." Uni meanwhile stared downward with a slight sense of unease at the sudden and massive jump in height. "So that's what she meant when she told us to watch our step..." The ravenette could almost feel her stomach rolling around at the sight, but there was something far more important to be careful of right now.

"Ooooh! This brings back memories," Uni stared at Neptune for a moment as the purplette took in the view in front of them before promptly leaning in closer to Nepgear.

"Hey, Nepgear," Said Nepgear glanced over to Uni before perking an eyebrow.

"W-what is it, Uni?" The purplette asked inquisitively.

"Make sure to keep an eye on her while we're here," The ravenette made a quick motion with her head in Neptune's direction. Problem is, Nepgear had no idea what that was supposed to mean, so it ultimately left her more confused than anything.

"What do you mean?" The ravenette deadpanned.

"Really? You're really asking me this?" Uni was almost starting to feel a bit irritated. She was hoping Nepgear would get it, but apparently she needed to have it spelled out for her after all. "Neptune doesn't exactly have the best track record when it comes to high places, remember?"

"Oh... I guess you're right about that," Now that Uni mentioned it, Neptune _did_ tend to fall from high places more often than most people would consider normal... Not to mention that she was leaning out pretty far to get a better look at... A chill shot up Nepgear and Uni's spines. "Neptune!"

"Uwah!" In that brief moment, Neptune nearly lost her balance from the heart attack inducing shout from Nepgear. Luckily, Uni and Nepgear were able to react in time – after almost suffering a heart attack of their own – to catch her and pull her back before their fears could be realized. "Geez, Nepgear, You can't just shout like that all of a sudden. It's bad for my heart," The purplette let out a relieved sigh as she brought a hand up to her chest to ease her racing heart.

"S-sorry about that," Nepgear said with a hand to her chest, recovering from her own near heart attack. "I guess I just got a bit paranoid for a second there..."

"That was close..." Uni added in, practically about to keel over.

"AH!" Lo and behold, the entire group was once more on the verge of a synchronized heart attack as Ram suddenly shouted out of nowhere, shooting her hand forward in the process, pointing at something off in the distance to the left. After a second of nearly falling over (again) the group looked over to see Ram and Rom looking...shocked(?) with wide eyes, as if the two were staring at a ghost. "That's..."

"What the goodness! What are you two...looking at...?" As the group calmed down, they all directed their eyes to whatever Ram was pointing at and each one found themselves involuntarily mimicking the two twins' expressions. Just barely within the group's line of sight, they could all make out a figure standing on a different island off in the distance. A short-statured figure with a familiar head of purple hair walking forward without a care in the world...

"Is... Is that really..." Uni's words caught in her throat before she could properly finish that sentence, as if she couldn't actually believe what she was seeing. It was almost implausible to think that it was actually going to be this easy.

"Neptune!" Without warning, Nepgear began calling out her sister's name. She just couldn't hold her voice back anymore! She called out to her sister as loud as she could, a part of her wishing that she had a megaphone with her like Uzume always did. "NEPTUNE! NEPTUNE! NEEEEEPTUUUUUNE!" Even though her voice quickly grew hoarse, Nepgear did not stop calling out to her sister for even a second.

The rest of the group all just kept looking at Nepgear as she kept screaming her sister's name at the top of her lungs. A look of sympathy crossed each of their faces as they began to realize just how important Neptune really was to her. It almost made them feel sorry for her, but in big Neptune's case, it filled her with the determination to reunite the two sisters no matter what.

"MINI MEEEEE!" Soon enough, big Neptune joined in on calling out the miniature CPU's name, much to everyone's surprise, especially Nepgear. She didn't really say anything, instead, she offered the surprised candidate a sincere smile. That was more than enough to get the message across, and soon enough, the rest of the group followed her lead. "MINI MEEEEEEE!"

"NEPTUNE!"

"MISS NEPTUNE!"

"NEPTUNE!"

Even as the group continued to scream, the figure they believed to be Neptune kept walking with her back to the group, as if she couldn't hear a single word. At some point the group came to the realization that the wind had begun to pick up and must have been making it difficult to make their voices known. They were clearly wasting their breath, and were forced to rest their voices, lest they run the risk of wearing them out. They were suddenly wishing that Uzume was there with them. Nobody could shout louder than she could. Although having her around probably wouldn't have made much of a difference.

"Argh! Why won't she look this way?!" Ram's voice was practically oozing with impatience.

"I don't think she'll be able to hear us from that far away... And the wind is pretty loud, too," Was Rom's attempt to answer Ram's concern.

"Then we just need to get closer!" Uni declared for all to hear. Everyone agreed almost unanimously.

"Neptune..." Nepgear was fighting to catch her breath. She felt as if she was going to cry any minute, but she wasn't going to let herself do that until she finally got to see her big sister's face again. As the candidate kept her gaze fixated on the figure walking away, adrenaline began to pump through her blood rapidly as the purple-haired figure began to speed up as it was almost completely out of view. That feeling of adrenaline took hold and soon Nepgear was filled with the same sense of euphoria she felt whenever she transformed into her HDD state. A bright light engulfed her form and all her friends were forced to shield their eyes. After a few brief seconds, the light dissipated and Nepgear had now taken on her Goddess form, Purple Sister.

"Nepgear?" Before Uni could say any more, Nepgear flew off in the direction of the figure she so desperately hoped to be Neptune. Nobody was able to stop her as she took off without them, leaving the other candidates with only one option for following after her. The group, excluding big Neptune, all transformed into their own HDD states. "I'll take the lead! You two bring big Neptune with you!" Uni ordered, taking off before the twins could make any objections. However in this case, they merely gave a mock-salute before grabbing onto the bigger Neptune before following after the Lastation candidate, whilst making sure to not drop the purple-haired ditz.

"Neptune!" Nepgear once again found herself calling out her sister's name. Nobody responded to her call, and she had somehow lost sight of that figure, but that wasn't stopping her from continuously calling out to her sister, fueled by a fierce determination. The Planeptune candidate whipped her head around frantically as she had quickly made it to where she had just seen Neptune, confusion taking hold. Somehow... She had vanished just before Nepgear had gotten there.

"Nepgear!" The purple candidate glanced over her shoulder as Uni slowed down to approach the purple candidate.

"Ah. Uni!"

"Geez! Don't just go off on your own like that all of a sudden!"

"I-I'm sorry... I just couldn't help myself when I saw... You know," Nepgear's expression became more downcast as she still couldn't see any sign of Neptune.

"Where did she even go, anyway?" Now that Uni got a look around, she couldn't see hide nor hair of Neptune. They had just seen her standing here, so how did she disappear so quickly like this? Did they all just imagine it or was someone really here? "How did we lose sight of her so easily like this?! We literally _just_ saw her!"

" _What is this feeling... Be careful! There's something nearby!_ "

"Huh?" What was that? Nepgear could have sworn she'd heard somebody just now. It was barely audible with the howling wind still making it hard to hear, but she knew she had definitely heard something. "Uni did you say something?"

"What? No,"

"I could have sworn I heard some say something just now."

"Are you sure you're not just hearing things? The wind is getting pretty bad up here, so maybe that's getting to us," Uni offered up as a possible explanation, although she didn't entirely believe in it herself.

"Yeah... That must be..." The purple candidate cut herself off as she heard a quiet, clashing sound from nearby, a noise that Uni had also picked up on. The two looked around for whatever could have made that noise, but with no luck. After a few seconds of aimless searching, something compelled Nepgear to direct her gaze upwards, but she was not quite ready for what she saw when she did. "What the goodness?"

"What is it Nep...gear..." When Uni followed Nepgear's lead and looked up, the Lastation candidate was met with the sight of a series of glowing blue swords forming a makeshift stairway from one floating island to another far above it. It was certainly quite a surprise to see something like that, but it did clear up a few things. "Is that how she disappeared so suddenly?" Uni asked no one in particular. While they still didn't know if it really was Neptune, it at least confirmed that there _was_ someone else here with them.

"What are you two looking at?" Nepgear and Uni looked back to see Rom and Ram approaching, each twin grabbing onto one of big Neptune's arms. Since Ram was a bit curious, she tried looking up at whatever Nepgear and Uni were looking at and found herself being just as surprised as they had been when they saw it. "Why are there swords in the sky?" Okay, so maybe she wasn't _quite_ as surprised as Nepgear and Uni had been, but still curious. "Did you guys put them up there or something?" The Lowee candidate asked as she and Rom gently let Neptune back down on the ground... Although it was hard to tell if it could still be called "ground" when it was at least a few miles away from the actual ground.

"Do we even know anyone who can make glowing swords out of thin air?" Uni asked, not really expecting an answer. And it was because she wasn't expecting an actual answer to that question that it came as a surprise when she actually did get one.

"Neptune..." Uni quirked an eyebrow at Nepgear's response. Everyone else fell silent as they considered the possibility that Nepgear might have been losing it, but that concern was quickly laid to rest when the purple candidate next spoke. "You've all seen it haven't you? My sister's special skill?"

Realization struck as the team finally understood what Nepgear was talking about. Neptune _did_ have a skill like that that she sometimes used in battle. Her "32 Bit Mega Blade," as she liked to call it. There were even times where she would summon them in a barrage of smaller blades instead of just blasting the enemy with one large sword, although no one had ever heard of Neptune using that ability to make a set of stairs... Although it wasn't entirely out of the realm of possibility, given that it was Neptune of all people.

"So you think she made all of those and went up there without us noticing?" Uni supposed that made sense to an extent, but... To do all of that without anyone noticing seemed like a ridiculously superhuman feat to pull off, even for a CPU like Neptune. Suddenly, Uni was starting to have doubts about all of this. "I know our sisters are pretty amazing and all, but this still seems a little..."

"I know..." Nepgear interrupted. "I know it might be a stretch to say that my sister really did do it, but... This is the only lead we have right now." Nobody could argue with that. The group could either push forward and face whoever awaited them, or they could leave and deal with not knowing. It should go without saying, but the first option sounded much better than the second one.

"Then I guess we don't have much of a choice, huh?" Big Neptune said nonchalantly. As if there was ever any doubt that they'd keep going! "Onward to-"

 **GRRROOOOOOHHH!**

From seemingly out of nowhere, a large, almost humanoid looking beast fell from the side of the island floating above the candidates. It fell quite some distance before finally crashing down onto the space of land a ways in front of the candidates with a **thud**.

"...Victory..." Everyone stared forward with deadpan expressions at the random encounter. Was the universe just throwing them a curve ball just to make things a bit more interesting or something? "But we already fought a tutorial boss..." Neptune whined while the beast was starting to stand up.

The impact had kicked up some dust, but as it faded away, the beast's true form was revealed. The monster was tall werewolf with blue fur and rather crazed eyes, reminiscent on a Fenrir's. The beast was also wearing a pair of pants and a necklace around its neck made up of sharp, spiky teeth, likely a trophy of its hunts or something. Once the wolf creature was up on its feet it grabbed a large greatsword that had conveniently fallen right next to its body, all the while snarling to itself, as if voicing its annoyance at the situation. The beast was essentially a werewolf version of a Fenrir...with pants.

"You think it saw us?" Neptune asked out of the blue. It was an innocent question, but as soon as the wolf beast turned its head to look at the group at the sound of her voice, the candidates all felt the urge to slap her a bit, but that would be going a bit too far. Instead, Neptune received a series of deadpan stares from the candidates and proceeded to rub the back of her head a bit nervously. "Eheheheh... Just asking."

Without another word, the purple-haired girl brought her swords out once more, facing the Fenrir-like beast. The monster in turn, gripped its oversized weapon just a little bit more tightly as its eyes set on its new prey.

"I guess we have no choice but to fight it." Uni said in a somewhat exasperated tone.

"Don't worry about it. That last monster was no biggie," Neptune waved a hand dismissively. "Besides, we've got four CPUs on our side, so it's all good... I think," The beast seemed to back up a couple of steps at the mention of the mention of a CPU. The action did not go by unseen by the group of five; A smirk began to form on Uni's lips.

"I guess you've got a point there. Let's just get this over with already," Uni in turn, summoned her own oversized weapon, a rifle, followed by the other candidates readying their own weapons. The beast seemed to step back even more at this sight, its eyes almost widening. Seeing it almost made the group feel sorry for the creature... Almost.

"I'll finish this in one blow!" Nepgear was the first to go in for an attack. She leaped into the air with her sword raised before plummeting towards the ground, ready to deliver a devastating attack. The monster did nothing but stare upwards at the candidate as her sword came down on its skull. "Panzer Blade!"

As Nepgear's sword came mere inches away from the dazed beast, the group witnessed its blank expression and knew that the battle was over before it even began. At least until...it smiled.

"Eh...?" It felt as if time had started going into slow motion. Just before Nepgear's blade cut into the werewolf beast, it stepped backwards just enough to avoid her attack by a hair's breadth, causing Nepgear's sword to stab into the ground. In that moment, things went from bad to worse as the beast stomped its foot into the back of Nepgear's sword before she could recover. The group's eyes widened in horror as the beast that had acted so timidly was now grinning as its hand clenched into a fist to deliver a painful blow right into her belly. "Gwoh!"

"Nepgear!" The blow sent the candidate flying backwards. Neptune was the first to act as she caught the candidate, but due to the force of the punch she was sent her skidding backwards. She was almost sent off the edge of the floating island if not for the other three candidates joining in to stop the two from careening off to their deaths. The team was able to stop the two from falling, but when Nepgear quietly revert to her human form, their panic grew even more intense. The group all worriedly called her name, but were silenced as the Fenrir beast chuckled and approached the team with its sword readied for battle.

"Oh crap!" Uni looked to the beast as it slowly approached, casting a brief glance at Nepgear's now unconscious form. She gulped as the gravity of the situation began to make itself crystal clear in her mind. Rom and Ram were both terrified, but were doing their best not to show it, even though they were failing miserably. "This thing is way stronger than the last one. How are we supposed to-"

Uni wasn't able to finish that thought as the beast charged directly at her. The Lastation candidate reacted by trying to blast the thing from afar with her bullets, but they were all blocked or deflected by the beast's giant sword. Rom and Ram tried to keep it back by using their ice magic, but proved to be almost completely ineffective as the beast easily dodged from side to side just before any of their attacks could connect.

Uni began to feel helpless as the beast was only a few feet away, its sword raised and ready to strike her down. But just before that could happen, Neptune jumped in front of her and blocked the incoming attack with her swords, buckling under the force of the strike. Rom and Ram tried to attack while it wasn't moving, but the beast pulled away from Neptune and dodged the oncoming magic attacks with ease.

Uni was left to watch the others as she fell to her knees, her body shaking. Rom, Ram and even Neptune all kept trying to stop the wolf, but it proved to be both stronger, and surprisingly good with its sword. The Lastation candidate wanted to help, but she couldn't move her legs. Instead, the girl fell to her knees as she reverted back to her human form, helplessly watching as her friends faced off against that vicious beast. It was so much stronger than any monster they'd ever faced. They probably could have won if Nepgear hadn't been caught off-guard, but now?

This felt like such a cruel joke. They'd all come this far and defeated such overwhelmingly powerful foes, and yet now they were about to be beaten by a mere werewolf monster from another dimension? That wasn't right! They were supposed to find Neptune and reunite her with Nepgear so they could go back home together, not die to some stupid wolf before they'd even gotten to see her!

"Damn it!" Uni forced herself back to her feet. Her legs were still shaky and her heart was pounding, but she didn't want to go down without a fight! "DAMN IT!" The raven-haired candidate screamed as she fired bullet after bullet at the rampaging wolf monster. However, her shouting had only alerted it to her plan of attack, and it merely changed around its plans by going after Rom and Ram. Neptune was quick to give chase, but the wolf beast was faster, avoiding any attacks the twins launched its way. "Rom! Ram! Get away from there!"

Uni tried to call out to the twins in the hopes that they would listen and book it out of there. Unfortunately, they were now experiencing the same sense of fear that Uni had felt just a little while ago. Even still, Uni and Neptune both called out to them, but they still couldn't move as the wolf monster came ever closer.

"No..." Time felt as if it was moving in slow motion as the greatsword was raised and ready to attack again. "Can't anyone stop that thing!?"

"I think I know someone who can..." A voice caught everyone's attention. The sound of footsteps echoed from nearby...no, from above, but nobody was still able to figure out what was going on, but there was one thing they knew for sure... Help had arrived. " **I** can!" Before anyone could properly register what was happening, a glowing blue sword came down upon the wolf beast's massive greatsword, causing the large beast to buckle under the pressure before it received a kick to the face and was sent skidding backwards a few feet.

Everyone's eyes collectively widened. Now they really _did_ feel they were seeing a ghost.

"I have no idea what's going on right now, but it looks like you could all use some help."

Nobody could really believe what was happening right now, but there was no denying that it was happening right now. Just then Nepgear was beginning to regain consciousness and slowly opened her eyes to see what was going on. She had a feeling that her friends needed her help and wanted to see what was happening, what she saw did see was...unbelievable. Her eyes widened and she could feel tears forming in her eyes as the image became more focused. A part of her wanted to just scream and jump for joy as her mind finally registered what she was seeing... She had finally found her... "Neptune!"


End file.
